Roundup: Chieftains sweep on senior night; Bucks top Bobcats

Published 8:33 am Friday, January 19, 2024

By Scott Novak

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DOWAGIAC — With the postseason rapidly approaching, the Dowagiac wrestling team hosted its lone regular-season match Wednesday night.

The Chieftains swept Coloma 57-21 and Eau Claire 53-24 in a pair of non-conference matches as they prepare for Wednesday’s final Lakeland Conference match at Berrien Springs.

Dowagiac is 2-0 in conference matches and needs to defeat the host Shamrocks to claim the regular-season conference championship.

Chieftain Coach Colin Burandt was pleased with his team’s effort Wednesday as it tuned up for their final league dual and then the individual tournament, which will be hosted by Brandywine on Saturday.

The Lakeland Conference Tournament counts as 50 percent of the league title, who Dowagiac must defeat Berrien Springs and win the individual tournament to claim the outright championship.

Brandywine is the defending conference champion.

“Everyone wrestled well,” Burandt said. “It was a good, tough quality dual. Everybody look liked they improved since Christmas break.”

Burandt said that the dual match with Niles at Southwestern Michigan College is counted as a home match, but he would like to add some more to the schedule.

“We are working on getting more home duals next season,” he said. “But scheduling is always tough.”

As far as the upcoming postseason, Burandt said the Chieftains need to continue to work hard and sharpen their skills.

“We need to clean some things up,” he said. “We need to put kids away when the opportunity is there instead of letting go of things. We just need to keep improving. I like what I saw tonight. We are getting better day-by-day. I can’t complain.”

Winning two matches on the night for Dowagiac were Markus Ottinger (106), Nicholas Green (120), Cameron White (138), Jacob Villegas (144), Israel Villegas (150), Hayden Groth (190), Isiah Hill (215) and Cal Chapman (285).

In the other Lakeland Conference match Wednesday, visiting Buchanan defeated Brandywine 63-18 to remain in second-place in the league standings.

Picking up wins for the Bucks were Holden Carrington (106), Benjamin Turay (113), Cooper Mabry (120), Camden Stover (126), Wyatt Riggs (138), Avery Scanlon (144), Leland Payne (157), Brayden Sebasty (175), Lucas Zeiger (190), Drew Andersen (215) and Dean Roberts (285).

Winning for the Bobcats were Kaiden Rieth (132), Agustin Gonzalez Torres (150) and Gavin Schoff (165).

 

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