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Wrestling: Rolling Meadows soars to debut win against Leyden

Rolling Meadows got its wrestling season off to flying start with a 37-28 victory over Leyden on Tuesday night before a big home audience in this annual nonconference season-opening wrestling dual.

The middle of the Mustangs' lineup proved the difference, with former Wheeling standout Tulga Zuunbayan making a big splash wearing his purple singlet for the first time. He recorded a major decision win at 160 pounds to help the hosts overcome a furious Leyden comeback after the Eagles fell behind 22-0 to start the night.

“We're fortunate to have Tulga with us this year, and along with Michael (Womeldorf) and Nick Delporte, the middle of our lineup should provide the type of firepower needed to challenge in our division and later on during the postseason,” said Mustangs coach John Bassler, who in his first year in charge led the club to a 17-4-0 overall record a year ago.

Womeldorf, a sectional qualifier last season, and teammate Delporte, who qualified for the state tournament two years ago, bookended Zuunbayan's 19-8 major decision win at 160 to give Meadows 15 unanswered points to erase what had become a 25-22 advantage by the visitors following an impressive 11-3 triumph by Leyden senior and four-year veteran Jeremiah Recinos.

“This was still a very good night for us, even though we lost,” said Recinos, who won 35 times on his way to advancing into the sectionals last February. “We've got a nice core of returning guys plus some newcomers who will help our lineup once they get some experience in the first part of the season.”

“Shane (Dziadosz), Wesam (Alabed, Fidel (Hernandez), Luis (Aburto) and Jeremiah gave us a big lift tonight by scoring 25 straight points for us, so that was a bright spot for sure,” said Leyden coach Mike Fumagalli. “But despite the loss, I felt very good about our effort against a very good Rolling Meadows team. We'll have some time to go back and look at the film and make some adjustments before this weekend when we're at Conant (in the Hruska Invite). Then we'll get a better look at some of the things we'll have to work with afterwards.”

Bassler knew after a favorable coin flip opened this dual at 195 pounds that the trio of Womeldorf, Zuunbayan and Delporte would likely pay huge dividends from 152-170 if needed. But after the Mustangs reeled off five straight wins, beginning with Eric Chalupa (195) and ending with Jackson Kohlberg at 113, it appeared this might be an easy one for the hosts.

But Leyden quickly got back into it to take the lead with Recinos' outcome.

“Their guy at 45 (Recinos) is a very impressive wrestler, but we battled back and finally closed them out with those three big wins,” said Bassler.

Christian Morales (220) and heavyweight Maciej Pogorzelski followed Chalupa with hard-fought decisions early in the evening, and senior Nate Osegueda ended things with a 5-3 Leyden victory at 182.

“There's no concern on my part after this result. The guys wrestled hard against a very good team, and all of us learned a few things from this night,” said Fumagalli. “This is a great group of kids, who have worked hard throughout the offseason, and since we began to train for the year, so I believe things are looking up for us.”

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