Jacobs takes it to McHenry
With inspiration brimming from two consecutive one-point losses to McHenry, Jacobs finally did away with the ghosts from its wrestling past against its longtime rival with a convincing 49-21 victory Thursday night in its Fox Valley Conference Valley Division season opener in Algonquin.
"We had never beaten McHenry heading into tonight's dual, and we've dropped back-to-back one-pointers (last year) on some questionable calls but tonight we beat them in convincing style, and it feels real good right now," said an elated Jacobs coach Gary Conrad.
"It's been tough the past couple of years with those two heartbreaking losses to them, so it's been something we've been talking and focusing on all this week," began Golden Eagles 160-pound senior Dean Lane, who was on the tail end of a 16-0 run, after the Warriors opened the proceedings with a pin from Derek Neises at 132 pounds.
"I thought we did a great job of responding to that opening loss, and it was especially good to see our upper weights come through when we needed it the most to help make this a big night for Jacobs wrestling," added Lane, who looks to be in peak form for his final year under Conrad, after seeing his 2015 postseason derailed by a broken hand.
Following the Neises pin, Chris Dranka, Jacob Sabella, Jake Hahnfeld and Lane answered the call with a pair of majors, a tech-fall from Dranka at 138 pounds, and a well-deserved 10-4 decision from Hahnfeld over Cesar Lopez in a tightly contested bout at 152 pounds.
"Those were some key wins for us and right when we needed them to grab back the momentum away from McHenry," offered Conrad.
"But then so was Bujacz' at 195 when he stuck his guy, followed by maybe the biggest win of the night from our heavyweight (David Schillmoeller) who stuck his opponent.
"Those two, and two other pins from our lower end of the lineup helped us ride the wave all the way until the end."
Bujacz, Jack Golnick (220) and Schillmoeller would inflict some heavy damage on the visitors after the Warriors drew close one last time (16-15) when Jake Leske (170) and Matt Nagel (182) put 9 points on the scoreboard for their club with a 7-5 decision and pin.
When the Golden Eagles' (9-0-0, 1-0-0) trio rolled past their opponents to increase the lead for the home side to 31-15, it was all Jacobs afterward.
Jayid Kastner (106) would bring the big crowd to its feet when he recorded a takedown to go up 5-3 just moments into OT but the Jacobs faithful went into orbit when the junior finished things off seconds later with a pin.
Freshman Dominic Tenayuca continued the onslaught with a fall of his own at 3:11, before Beau Harrier collected the final 6 points of the night for the home side with a forfeit at 120 pounds.
"We were able to come back at win the conference tournament after McHenry beat us out for the division last year, but our goal this season is to win both," said Conrad. "They were without their 120-pounder, and they lost four state qualifiers from a year ago, but this was a good start nonetheless for us. But Huntley is a well-coached and very good team, so it should be a great dual when we see them in mid-January, and that may be for the division then."