By David Tesitor
Denver CO- For five area wrestlers their road to placing at state begins with a must win matchup tomorrow morning against their opponents. It doesn’t stop there. To place, they need to win the next three bouts to wrestle for fifth place and four match-ups to wrestle for third. For the losers, their state tournament experience would be over.
At 113 pounds, Jacob Tenorio took on Stetson Loader of Baca County. Loader is the top ranked wrestler in the state and had little trouble against Tenorio. He defeated Tenorio by Technical Fall, 21-4. Loader sported a protective face mask this week because of an injury he sustained after the regional competition last weekend. Tenorio will wrestle Karin Wadsworth of North Park in his opening bout.
John Paul vigil also lost his opening round match against JD Chenoweth of Baca County in an 8-5 decision. Vigil held onto a slim lead entering the third period, 5-3 and was in control until Chenoweth reversed a hold and scored on a near pin to tale the 8-3 lead with 26 seconds remaining. For Vigil, time ran out and so did his chances for a state title. He will face Luke Brown of Yuma tomorrow. Brown is a sophomore with a 16-12 record.
Both John Burch of John Mall and WD Arnold of La Veta lost in their 132 pound matchups. Burch faced Mark Edmonds, the top ranked wrestler in the state and took down his opponent early on in the match to score a 2-0 lead. Edmonds then pinned Burch at 1:21. Burch faces Wyat Mattausch of Delores.
WD Arnold lost to Kyle Hunter of Merino in what could be the first bug upset of the day. Hunter was unranked while Arnold was fifth. If both win their matches tomorrow, they will face each other in the consolation semi finals, sending one to the placement rounds and the other home.
The last county wrestler was Elliot Blessman who lost his match to Reed Christensen of Akron in a time of 1:29 seconds. He will face Mark Schroeder, the number four wrestler in the state in his next match.
We will be live at the Pepsi Center again tomorrow morning with postings on our Face Book page beginning at 10 am and will be posting through the day. Be sure to check us out.
