Cassaw Places 3rd at Prairie Classic
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The St. Francis Indian wrestling team competed in the 26-team Bob Kuhn Prairie Classic Wrestling Tournament in Hays on Friday and Saturday, January 24th and 25th. The Indians placed 21st as a team scoring 30 points.
Clay Cassaw placed 3rd at 132 pounds. Other team members who scored team points in the tournament were Lane Hoffman, Lane Hobrock, Kyler Zweygardt, and Shakotah Blanka.
Goodland won the team title scoring 193.5 team points. Kapaun Mt. Carmel placed 2nd with 186.5. Spring Hill placed 3rd with 125 and Salina Central was 4th with 116.5. Other team placings and scores were: 5th - Phillipsburg 115.5, 6th - Hoisington 114, 7th - Hays 107.5, 8th - Campus 91, 9th - Ulysses 84.5, 10th - Maize South 70.5, 11th (tie) - Hugoton and Oakley 67, 13th - Riley County 64, 14th - Russell 63, 15th - Ellis 61, 16th - Buhler 60, 17th - Ellsworth, 18th - St. Thomas Aquinas 54.5, 19th - McPherson 48, 20th - Weld Central (CO) 43, 21st - St. Francis 30, 22nd - Larned 29, 23rd - Goddard Eisenhower 26, 24th (tie) Trego Community and TMP-Marion 23, 26th - Wichita Independent 0.
Results of individual matches from the Prairie Classic are listed below.
Clay Cassaw - 132 pounds - Placed 3rd
Defeated Kobe Armbruster of Ellis by fall (1:59)
Defeated Sam Wilson of Kapaun Mr. Carmel by major decision (10-0)
Lost to Brandon Dofat of Spring Hill by decision (3-2)
Defeated Austin Hernandez of Goodland by decision (4-0)
Defeated Mario Rodriquez of Ulysses by decision (5-4)
Garrett Brunk - 138 pounds
Lost to Zach Martin of Ellsworth by fall (2:59)
Lost to Zach Irvin of Weld Central (CO) by fall (2:44)
Justin Pacheco - 145 pounds
Lost to Chris Truesdale of Riley County by fall (3:23)
Lost to James Dinkel of Goodland by decision (4-7)
Lane Hoffman - 152 pounds
Defeated Gibson Eyestone of Riley County by major decision (13-4)
Lost to Wayne Flipse of Oakley by fall (3:23)
Defeated Grant Murphy of Russell by decision (5-3)
Lost to Easton Ryser of Salina Central by fall (2:20)
Lane Hobrock - 170 pounds
Defeated Kiowa Higdon of Hays by decision (6-1)
Lost to Tom Hand of Kapaun Mt. Carmel by fall (2:56)
Lost to Drew Townson of Campus by decision (8-6)
Kyler Zweygardt - 220 pounds
Defeated Ryan Bray of Campus by decision (7-0)
Lost to Evan Paxton of Weld Central (CO) by fall (1:31)
Lost to Skyler Tebo of Ellis by technical fall (15-0)
Shakotah Blanka - 285 pounds
Lost to Mason Rains of Oakley by fall (1:30)
Defeated Clay Reed of Riley County by fall (0:20)
Lost to Kaiden Reed of Larned by fall (2:08)
Coach Loyd had the following comments, "I felt like we did perform better over the weekend in Hays against tougher competition. This tournament is one of the tougher in the state and we had an opportunity to wrestle some of the best kids from bigger schools and I feel like it was important for us to do that. I don’t know if the kids were kind of shell shocked from the quality of competition that was because we did lose some matches that we shouldn’t of lost, but at least we battled a little better than we did Thursday night. Right now we are four weeks out from regionals and I’d rather have us drop matches we shouldn’t now and have the time to learn from our mistakes than to be dropping matches come regional time. It’s important for these kids to push each other to be great every day, and to keep focused on what our goals for this season. It’s easy to stay positive and to keep working when things are good and going your way, it’s when things are tough and you hit bumps in the road that your true character comes out, and you can either learn from it and get back up and work harder, or you can stay down. I think our guys will pick themselves up and come to practice every day to improve and work to get better.
Individually, Clay Cassaw had a great tournament. I think coming into this weekend he thought he could wrestle with anybody, and after this weekend I get the impression that now he knows he can wrestle anybody. He did very well and is taking big steps in the right direction at the right time. Garrett Brunk had a tough weekend, you look at the results and see that he got pinned twice, however he was ahead in both matches and unfortunately got caught in tight pin holds that he couldn’t get out of. It’s important for him to keep his confidence. Justin Pacheco was winning his first match and again got caught in a throw and lost by fall. Second match he just didn’t wrestle like he’s capable of and lost to a kid that I know Justin knows he is better than. Lane Hoffman had a fairly good weekend in a tough weight class. He was a couple of matches away from placing, but I think he had some improvements this weekend. Lane Hobrock competed fairly well, he lost a match right at the end that knocked him out of the tournament and if he had won that I feel like he very well could have won his next match that would of guaranteed him a place. Kyler Zweygardt just got beat by a couple of kids that just had a little more experience than he did. I feel like he wrestled well again he just found himself in a very tough weight class. Shakotah Blanka again was in a weight that ended up being tougher than I had originally thought. There were some very good heavyweights there that could move very well. He got beat by a couple of kids that weren’t better than him and I hope that he knows that. He can wrestled with anyone if he just puts his mind to it."
The wrestling team will compete against Hoxie in a dual in St. Francis on Thursday evening, January 30th. Wrestling begins at 6:30 p.m. in the St. Francis High School Gymnasium. Senior Night will also be observed during the evening.
