Six area wrestlers advanced through Saturday’s class 2A sectional competition at Benton High School.

For the Mid-Prairie Golden Hawks they crowned two champions and had one grappler advance as a runner-up through wrestlebacks. Cael Garvey won the title at 195lbs. The state’s No. 3 ranked wrestler in the weight class, pinned his way to the title, including a championship match fall over Jack Geels of Williamsburg in under a minute. Mid-Prairie’s other champ came at 285lbs where Gannon Callahan, the state’s No. 12 ranked wrestler at that weight, also pinned his way to the title, scoring a fall over Columbus/Winfield-Mt. Union heavyweight Russel Coil to claim gold, the 100th of his career. After the meet Garvey and Callahan each talked about their championship match and how it felt to move on. Garvey broke down the day first, “I was trying to get into that kid and he just tried to back away from me. We ended up going close to the edge of the mat and I had double overs so I just threw him and put him away. This feels really good. I’m one of the top people and I can say I got 100 pins in my high school career. That’s a pretty cool feeling. Getting through today is just one more thing I can take off my chest and focus on wrestling.”

Callahan said, “We were just being really aggressive in the last match. Once I beat that kid at the WACO tournament I wanted to beat him down early and get to scoring points. I knew he was going to choose going on bottom in the second and that’s not a good place to be when I want to ride someone out and pin ’em. Senior year, you want to go as far as you can, so this is just one of the small steps to getting all the way up there you know.”

At 170lbs, Golden Hawk junior Kaden Meader also advanced as a runner-up. After dropping his semifinal to eventually champion Koley Kelly of Benton, Meader got a shot at redemption in a wrestleback and cashed it in, taking true second on a third period fall over Ryder Bunch of Mount Vernon. The Golden Hawks finished fifth of six teams with 141 points. Mount Vernon won the team championship with 230 points.

The Columbus/Winfield-Mt. Union Wildcats will also send three to districts. Wildcat 120lber Lane Scorpil remained unbeaten on the year en route to the sectional championship. He won the title match by major decision over Jordan Thys of Benton. Scorpil talked after the match about the day, “Just had to stay on my feet, create my offense and keep my angles. Put one, two, three shots together and come out with takedowns and points. Make sure I stay fast-paced and flow. Get to my offense and see what works for me. This feels good. I know what I need to work on and I feel confident.”

Columbus 220lber Kai Malone advanced to the next round as a runner-up after falling to Clark Younggreen of Mount Vernon. At 285lbs Russel Coil got through as a runner-up by winning a 9-3 wrestleback decision over Trystin Lashley of Mount Vernon. The Wildcats were fourth in the team race with 147 points.

All six wrestlers will compete at Saturday’s class 2A district meet at Williamsburg with a chance to advance to state. You can hear interviews with all six qualifiers and their coaches during this week’s edition of the KCII PM Sports Page on Wednesday and Thursday.

QUALIFYING MATCH VIDEOS

MID-PRAIRIE

Cael Garvey

 

Gannon Callahan

 

Kaden Meader

 

COLUMBUS/WINFIELD-MT. UNION

Lane Scorpil

 

Russell Coil