DOWAGIAC — On a night when Dowagiac wrestling honored its eight seniors, visiting four-time defending Wolverine Conference champion Edwardsburg spoiled the party.

The Eddies defeated the Chieftains 45-24.

Prior to the varsity match, the Chieftains honored John Hassle, Tyler Houston, Adrian Lee, Lamberto Paredes, Mikey Schlup, Chris Schultz and Luke Staten, with parents and relatives.

Dowagiac and Edwardsburg battled back and forth for a while, with the Eddies pulling away to the easy victory in the closing weight classes.

Veteran coaches Colin Burandt of Dowagiac and Jesse Becraft of Edwardsburg both saw good things out of their teams, but know there is plenty of work to be done before February when the state tournament gets under way.

“We have got to just keep working on the basics,” Burandt said. “That is our big downfall right now. We have to make the right mat-time decisions. We are trying to do too much.”

Burandt said the Chieftains are close to getting everybody into the right weight classes so that they can begin working on becoming a strong team.

“We are getting close,” he said. “We have to get one kid down to 145 to fill that hole. Then we will be pretty close to the lineup we will have at the end of the year.”

Becraft enjoys wrestling Dowagiac early as it allows him to see what his team needs to work on moving forward.

“This was a good start tonight,” he said. We always look forward to wrestling them as they are one of the best teams in the league. We wrestled well tonight, but we have to keep improving and keep getting better.”

Dowagiac and Edwardsburg traded wins at the starting weight of 152 and at 160 pounds.

The Eddies then ran off three straight wins, one via pin, one by technical fall and one by decision to take an 18-3 lead heading into the 285-pound match.

The Chieftains’ Wyatt Bailey pinned Carter Pethick in 2:33 before Dowagiac’s Jordan Simpson pinned Caleb Fielder to cut the Eddies’ lead to 18-12.

Dowagiac would not get much closer as the Chieftains and Eddies would trade wins, with Tyler Huston (119) and Alex McIntosh picking up wins at 119 and 130.

Edwardsburg picked up wins with Andrew Castelucci (112), Kaden Parsons (125), Noah Tinkham (135), Austin Peacock (140) and Jacob Reece 145.

The Chieftains are back in action on Saturday as they travel to Richland to compete in the Gull Lake Invitational.

Dowagiac will also travel to Ohio over the Christmas break to compete in the Defiance Tri-State Border Wars starting Dec. 28.