Eagle Wrestlers Take Part In Midstates Conference

Angel Rodriguez works for a fall against Nathan Brtek of Norfolk Catholic. Photo by Kathy Marvin.

The O'Neill wrestlers participated in their first Midstates Conference Tournament this past Friday.  

  The tournament was scheduled to take place Saturday, but with the impending winter weather the tournament was moved up to Friday afternoon.  

The Eagles placed third overall as a team behind champion Madison and runner-up Battle Creek.  The Eagles finished with 139.5 team points, just 1.5 points behind Battle Creek.  Medalists for the Eagles were as follows:  Jon Marvin, first; Joe Gillham, second; Blake Walters, first; Cory Rowse, fourth; Angel Rodriguez, first; David Fox, second; Spencer Knopp, third; and Morgan Sterns, second.  O'Neill senior Angel Rodriguez's conference championship was the first tournament championship of his career.  Rodriguez notched the victory in dramatic fashion, avenging a loss from earlier in the season with a come from behind victory over Jacob Meyer from Boone Central.  The O'Neill wrestler was down by one point in the waning seconds of the match before he was able to take Meyer down to his back securing the near-fall in a 9-5 victory.  O'Neill assistant coach Tyler Cole commented on the Eagle's performance, "We had some very good individual performances today.  Team wise, it was disappointing to finish behind Battle Creek by such a slim margin.  The one and a half points that separated us is basically one more win in the tournament or even a pin when we just won by decision.  We need to find a way to get those.  Hopefully our guys recognize this and we'll see some improvements going into districts."  

The Eagles will be back in Norfolk this Friday for the C-2 District tournament.