Knights storm back to beat Waynesville

By CHRIS PERKINS
Daily Journal Sports Writer

FARMINGTON — For a lot of wrestling teams, falling behind 15-0 after three bouts would be cause for concern. For the Farmington Knights, it could be called a case of spotting the opposition a 15-point lead with 11 matches remaining, as the Knights roared back in the middle weight classes to score a 38-30 victory over the Waynesville Tigers and remain unbeaten in dual meets this season.

A 12-5 victory by Jake Cyr over Todd Brackett in the opening bout gave Waynesville an early 3-0 lead. A pin at 3:31 by Aaron Morgan over Alec Thomas at 112 pounds, followed by Russell Flores pinning Matt Evans at 1:39 opened up a 15-0 Waynesville lead.

In the 125-pound weight class, Brad Wisdom got Farmington on the scoreboard by pinning Eric Mateo at 3:01, while Josh Kelleher followed that up with a fall of his own at 130 pounds, beating Jake Main at 3:07.

Brandon McDowell gave the Knights their first lead of the night at 135 pounds, controlling his entire match against Julian Hutchings before scoring a majority decision 15-7, giving Farmington four points and a 16-15 lead. Connor Kellog extended Farmington’s lead to five with his own majority decision, 11-0 over Sam Dowling at 140 pounds.

A low scoring match at the 145-pound weight class gave Farmington their fifth straight victory, as Nicholas Hoehn got past Josh Cyr 5-2.

Waynesville cut the Farmington lead back to five points, 23-18, in the 152-pound match. Trailing 3-0 entering the third period, Alex Hempstead got a takedown and a three-point near-fall for a 5-3 victory over Kyle Sullivan.

Farmington got six points in the 160-pound match, but there was a question over  how to score it. Craig Wilson thought he had a pin at 2:53 over Jason Spaw.

“With the new rules, we have the option of just allowing the man up and giving up the point,” Farmington head coach Mark Krause said. “They said we restarted in the wrong position, so we had to do it again.”

Instead of a fall, Wilson won the match and maximum points less than 30 seconds after the restart, as Spaw was forced to withdraw after suffering an ankle injury, giving Wilson the victory by injury default. With the six points, Farmington took a 29-18 lead.

After Derek Smallen was pinned at 171 pounds, Farmington’s Kevin Pothetos and Waynesville’s Andre Taylor took part in the bout of the night in the 189-pound class. Pothetos led after two periods 4-2, but a takedown by Taylor early in the third tied the score. With 40 seconds left, Pothetos escaped to gain a point and a 5-4 lead.

After both wrestlers looked for an opening, Taylor found one with 10 seconds remaining, getting Pothetos on the mat. Pothetos managed to get away again and made a takedown of his own to win the match 7-4, opening a 32-24 lead with two matches remaining.

With Farmington needing just one victory to seal the match, Kendall May ended the drama quickly in the 215-pound weight class, pinning Joe Wiehe in 24 seconds.

“Our experienced kids came through for us tonight,” Krause said. “Right through the middle, the guys were battling and that made the difference.”

Farmington travels to Kansas City for the Toshiba Business Solutions Kansas City Nationals this weekend, featuring 24 top wrestling programs from eight states.