Cary-Grove's Rands takes 215 title at Grant
Celebratory hugs and yells quickly turned into a scrum for Grant's wrestling team following its own regional tournament.
Bulldogs coach Ryan Geist went "referee" on his team and quickly called an end to the playful grappling.
"Make sure Lee's still alive," Geist joked.
Star Lee Munster escaped, like all good wrestlers do, and so did the host Bulldogs on Saturday. Barely.
Grant captured its sixth straight Class AA regional, prevailing in Fox Lake by the closest margin during its title streak, as it totaled 200.5 points, exactly 2 more than Crystal Lake Central. Prairie Ridge (101) was a distant third among the nine schools.
Call Grant's title a minor upset.
"If we wrestled to our seed at this tournament, we lose," said Geist, whose team earned a berth in the Libertyville team sectional Tuesday, Feb. 19. "So we overachieved in terms of the seeding."
Grant boasted four champions -- Izzy Montemayor, Shelby Temple, Munster and Tyler Becker -- and qualified 11 wrestlers for next weekend's Barrington individual sectional, which starts Friday.
Those Bulldogs who performed better than their seed were Joe Loris (second at 160 pounds), Dave Monroy (second, 215) and Andrew Zapfel. Loris (fourth, 285).
"I think everybody was (more motivated)," acknowledged the sophomore Munster, who had 2 pins and a major decision in the 140-pound final against Central freshman Joey Kielbasa in improving to 23-0.
Prairie Ridge's Sam Campbell eked out a 3-1 win over Loris at 160 for his second consecutive regional title. Campbell (30-3), who'll play football for Concordia University-St. Paul, recorded a takedown in the final 40 seconds to defeat the upset-minded Loris (27-14).
"We both like wrestling the edge of the mat," Campbell said. "We weren't necessarily stalling, but we were wrestling kind of slower, and then I just kept trying to take shots, take shots. I couldn't get anything. I waited for him to make a mistake. He led with his head too much, I spun behind him and got 2 (points) at the end."
Monroy injured his knee at the North Suburban Conference meet last week, but won a pair of decisions before defaulting in the 215 final to Cary-Grove's Paul Rands (34-3), who was the Trojans' lone champ.
After top-seeded Izzy Montemayor (34-3) earned a technical fall over Crystal Lake South's Mike Fetherling for the 125 crown, Lakes junior Matt Holmes won his first regional championship thanks to a 3-2 win over Central's Mike Buhr at 130.
Temple decisioned Cary-Grove's Josh Nelson 6-1 at 135, starting a run of three straight titles for Grant. Munster followed by dominating his match, and then Becker barely bested Antioch's Bobby Wiatr, prevailing 5-4 thanks to a mid-third period takedown.
Prairie Ridge's Brendan Barrett majored Grant's Tyler Dempsey for the 152 title, beginning a run of five straight runner-up finishes for the Bulldogs.
It was Campbell over Loris; Central's Trevor Parlberg over Josh DeLuca (5-2); Central's Ricky Peisker over Jake Brown (5-3); and C-G's Rand over Monroy (default).
"The semifinal round was our highlight," said Geist, whose Bulldogs also got through Roque Bustos at 130 (third). "We won a lot of close matches in the upper weights. It was kind of weird (because) in the finals we lost a lot of close matches to make a close meet of it."
Like Grant, Central also advanced 11 wrestlers to Barrington -- including champs Trevor Jauch (103), Christian Malouf (112), Ryan Jauch (119), Parlberg and Peisker.
Crystal Lake South got a runner-up finish from Cullen Smith (103), in addition to Fetherling. Kean Loupee (145) and Julio Padila (189) both finished third.
Other third-place finishers included Lakes' Kyle Gibson (103, Prairie Ridge's Mike Smith (112) and Ian Byrne (171), and Cary-Grove's Alec Hargrove (119).
McHenry's Jordan Walsh won the 285 championship with a 6-1 decision over Prairie Ridge's Eddie Smith.