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Wrestling goes against Howell, Marquette, Vianney and others in dual tournament

Art: Alexander Deiters

With regular season competitions currently increasing yet ceasing at the end of January, the St. Louis U. High wrestling team is putting all of its focus on using the remaining matches and practices to prepare for the District Wrestling Tournament while attempting to ward off late-season injuries and Covid-driven quarantines.

“We’re really going to be hitting it hard for three weeks with how many matches the wrestlers will have. It’ll wear on guys, but it’ll also give us a lot of things to work on in the weeks leading to districts,” said second-year coach and former SLUH wrestler Will Whitney. “All of our mistakes will be fresh in our minds, so we can go make adjustments and focus on the little things. I’m hoping we’ll be headed into districts looking really sharp and ready to win some matches.”

After an important first full week of January, which provided the wrestlers with two quad meets and plenty of tough matches, the team had only practices scheduled for its second week back. However, the team had a tournament at Francis Howell that Saturday, giving the wrestlers an opportunity to showcase progress from the previous week.

Following a week of heavy drilling and intense live wrestling, the team left practice on Friday excited to wrestle district opponents in a dual-tournament format the following day. Featuring Francis Howell, Marquette, Fort Zumwalt East, Eureka, and Vianney, it was a great chance for the wrestlers to cram several matches into a short period of time.

First, the Jr. Bills wrestled Marquette. Off to a slow start, the only SLUH wrestlers to record wins were Bobby Conroy and Gio Loftis, who both pinned their opponents in the first period.

Motivated by their poor performance in the first dual, the wrestlers showed much more energy and intensity during the second dual of the day against Fort Zumwalt East. Will Coovert, Leo Wagner, Conroy, Loftis, Logan Nuemann, and Cayden Owens all either won by falls or major decisions.

SLUH then faced the tournament host, Francis Howell. Again, only two SLUH wrestlers, Nuemann and Owens, exited the dual with wins. 

Next, SLUH wrestled Eureka, where Wagner, Cam Perry, and Nuemann all won while SLUH also received a handful of byes from empty Eureka weight classes.

The Jr. Bills concluded the tournament by wrestling Vianney. In this final dual, Wagner, Onder, and Conroy secured victories for SLUH.

At the Francis Howell tournament, the wrestlers displayed their ability to listen to and act on the coaches’ advice and criticism following poor matches, a quality which will serve them well in the remainder of the season as adapting to different opponents is key to winning postseason matches. Additionally, Conroy recorded his 100th win at the tournament, showcasing his four years of hard work and dedication to SLUH wrestling.

“Reaching 100 wins is a huge accomplishment. It’s not only hard to stay healthy and on the mat that whole time, but you have to do nearly everything right for four seasons to get to that point. It just shows all of his practice and offseason work,” said Whitney. “On the mat, Bobby shows a lot of creativity. Wherever a lot of people would stop or end their move, Bobby is going onto his next move. He is always wrestling two steps ahead of where most people are.”

While the varsity wrestling team was at Francis Howell, the junior varsity wrestlers were at Fox High School. Whitney was the sole coach at this tournament and offered comments on the matches wrestled by freshmen Tate Townsend and Mario DelPietro.

“It was awesome to see both freshmen get good wins where they did things right and got into good positions. Tate’s season got cut short by a broken arm, but to see him beat a kid by 14 points and pin him and work on moves we’ve drilled in practice was great,” said Whitney. “Mario was a ferocious wrestler. He is a guy who’s really gonna grow in this sport and be a great competitor.”

Following both tournaments on Saturday, the wrestlers returned Monday for one practice until a dual meet versus Lindbergh in the Danis Field House on Tuesday.

Although SLUH was missing some wrestlers due to Covid quarantines and other injuries, every wrestler who was eligible for a match on Tuesday was able to find an opponent from Lindbergh.

Highlights from the night included pins from Onder, Conroy, and Neumann. Although the 48-18 loss was not the outcome the coaches were looking for, they still believed the team could use the dual to improve.

“The score didn’t go our way, and we lost a lot of close matches. The other coaches and I saw a lot of little places to make adjustments, so it will give us something to work on between now and districts,” said Whitney.

The next day, the Jr. Bills traveled to St. Charles to wrestle Orchard Farms in a dual meet. Due to a holes in the lineups of both SLUH and Orchard Farms, there were only four SLUH wrestlers in attendance. Regardless, the individual results were favorable.

Onder pinned his opponent while Coovert and Wagner won by decision (a win by seven or fewer points). Loftis lost by fall, but gave a tough opponent a difficult fight.

With no competitions until next Tuesday, which features a quad meet at Westminster Academy, the team is looking forward to working on their mistakes from this past week’s tournaments and duals and ultimately preparing themselves further for the District Tournament.

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

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