In past years, the Arundel Wildcats and South River Seahawks have traded blows on the wrestling mat to rather even matches and tight dual meet scores, but that was not the case, Tuesday, when the Seahawks traveled to Arundel and handled the opening matches of their 45-28 win.
South River showed no mercy in the dual meet with in-county rival Arundel, Tuesday night, cruising to a 39-point team lead and finishing off the Wildcats, 45-28.
The Seahawks opened with seven consecutive wins, winning every match in the firs half of the dual meet, and did so with six falls and one decision to the enormous lead.
“We knew coming in that it was going to be a tough match, and we knew coming in, as it was with Old Mill and Stephen Decatur, that it was going to come down to bonus points,” Seahawks’ coach John Klessinger explained. “We knew where we had to step-up and man-up, and not give up points.”
Winning bonus points by pinning five consecutive times from 189 through 112, Mike Santini (189), Anthony Rossi (215), Travis Clow (285), Dale Keith (103) and Austin Alley (112) decked their opponents after teammates Larry Thompson (160) and Patrick Owens (171) started the meet with two wins of their own.
Thompson, trailing in his match, hit a reversal late second period and put his opponent directly to his back for the pin, as Rossi came back in his second period for the fall, as well.
“All of us have a job that we are assigned to do, whether it is going out and not get pinned or go out and get the pin,” Seahawk captain Keith said. “I was just focused on doing my job, and my job was to go out and pin the kid.”
Arundel’s Logan Reece brought a brief intermission to the South River dominance with a fall at 119, and setup a three-win streak by the Wildcats’ Justin Goodwin (130), Steve Kidwell (135) and a Tyler Goodwin forfeit at 140 to cut the lead to 45-19.
Zach Johnson continued the winning for the Wildcats with an 11-8 decision at 145, and Chris Milhorn closed the meet with a 24-second fall at 152.
“Wrestling Arundel in the past, we have lost to them, we have beaten them, and this year it was pretty straightforward going out,” Owens said. “We knew we were going to secure that win because we have a better lineup and we have been working hard all year.”
Klessinger hopes this start to the season is a new trend that will pick up with his young team, returning just a handful of varsity wrestlers to his lineup.
“This is a team, and of our 14 guys we have four or five with good varsity experience,” Klessinger said. “This is a team that is going to get better throughout the year.
“And this is a good win, but in no way do we want this to be the highlight of our year. We have a couple tough teams coming up this week, and we will take it one match at a time and hope we get better as a team.”
South River will next take to the mat on Dec. 21, going head-to-head with Glen Burnie, while Arundel will head to Centennial Dec. 16.
South River 45, Arundel 28
103 Dale Keith (SR) fall :29 Allen Johnson (AR) 0-33
112 Austin Alley (SR) fall :44 Chris Geraghty (AR) 0-39
119 Logan Reece (AR) fall 3:10 Trey Buchinelli (SR) 6-39
125 Josh Perren (SR) fall 4:57 Vinny Kindall (AR) 6-45
130 Justin Goodwin (AR) dec 19-12 Eric Quintinilla (SR) 9-45
135 Steve Kidwell (AR) maj dec 12-2 Daniel Murphy (SR) 13-45
140 Tyler Goodwin (AR) forfeit 19-45
145 Zach Johnson (AR) dec 11-8 Mike Circo (SR) 22-45
152 Chris Milhorn (AR) fall :24 William Brown (SR) 28-45
160 Larry Thompson (SR) fall 3:36 Nick Abury (AR) 0-6
171 Patrick Owens (SR) dec 15-10 Evan Williams (AR) 0-9
189 Mike Santini (SR) fall 2:23 Darryl Bagley (AR) 0-15
215 Anthony Rossi (SR) fall 4:32 Thomas Jovinelli (AR) 0-21
285 Travis Clow (SR) fall 1:19 Luke Brownlee (AR) 0-27
