Amber Schaack, Landon Ostlie and Shane Gallagher from Jamestown High School and Michele Quiles and Jacob Kelsey from Jamestown College have been named Athletes of the Week by the Jamestown Optimist Club.
Schaack, a freshman on the Blue Jay girls’ hockey team, was involved in every goal JHS scored in a 9-2 loss to Fargo North and 5-3 defeat to Grand Forks.
In all, she had three goals and two assists against two of the top teams in the state. She now has seven goals and six assists on the year.
Ostlie, a junior on the JHS swimming and diving team, placed second in the 200 IM and 100 backstroke at the Manley Memorial Meet on Jan. 9 in Fargo. His time of 58.31 set the new JHS record in the backstroke, beating a record held by Don Schmeichel since 1989.
He also swam legs on the 200 and 400 free relay teams that placed third.
Gallagher, a senior on the JHS wrestling team, placed third at 215 pounds at the 26-team Bismarck Rotary. He had four wins, including two major decisions to improve his record to 15-5.
Quiles, a sophomore from Silver Creek, N.Y., on the Jimmie women’s wrestling team, went 3-0 in her matches at the National Dual Meet in Cedar Falls, Iowa on Jan. 9-10 to lead JC to a third-place finish.
Kelsey, a senior from Cleburne, Texas, on the JC men’s basketball team, had 22 points and two assists in the Jimmies’ win over South Dakota Tech Jan. 8 and then scored five points and had three assists and held Black Hills State leading scorer Cain Atkinson scoreless on Jan. 9.
CENTERVILLE — The Ottumwa Bulldogs wrestling program had 10 wrestlers compete in the Big Red Invite in Centerville on Saturday, the most classes they’ve been capable of filling all season.
The extra wrestlers allowed Ottumwa to round out the top-10 with 76.5 points. Kirksville finished first out of sixteen teams with 217 points, while host Centerville posted 166.5 points for third place. The Fairfield Trojans finished sixth with 130 while Chariton came in 11th with 69 team points.
Josh Greiner, a 10th-ranked junior, pushed his unbeaten streak to 27-0 with a first place finish at 135. In the championship match, Greiner knocked off the second-ranked wrestler in all of Class 2A, Kyler Risher of Centerville, for first place.
Megan Black, the only female wrestler at the invite, finished in second place at 112. Black upset the No. 1 seed of the tournament in the quarterfinals, winning by pin, before being beat in the finals.
“Overall we wrestled pretty well,” said Ottumwa coach Kevin Cochran. “Megan stepped up and wrestled the way she should.”
=====================================================================================================Monday, January 18, 2010
More Wednesday
OK, before you send any angry e-mail or phone calls Paul Valencia’s way about the Clark County girls wrestling tournament, let me say that he is planning on following up on the girls event as part of Wednesday’s prep page in The Columbian.
This year was the first the girls have had their own brackets as part of the this tournament.
If you can’t wait until Wednesday or you just want to read more about the boys tournament, go to The Columbian’s high school sports blog at www.columbian.com/preps.
Although Westerly, R.I., captured the Dan Gionet Pelham Tournament for the second straight year, Pentucket, Whittier, Georgetown and Pelham had plenty to celebrate.
Pentucket and Whittier finished second and third, respectively, in the 17-team field, Georgetown was sixth and Pelham was seventh, and all had impressive individual champions.
Pentucket was paced by undefeated 145-pound champ Austin Perreault (22-0), who beat Whittier's Jake Tannian in the finals for the second straight week, this time by an 8-1 score.
Also winning titles for the Sachems were 171-pounder Peter Koopman and 189-pounder Jordan Pinzone. Koopman, who didn't wrestle last year, and Pinzone both had three pins on the day. Tom Funk (103) and Andy Stasiuk (171) were both runners-up for Pentucket.
For Whittier, 103-pounder Shannon Constantine pinned her way to her second tournament crown and second Outstanding Wrestler (OW) award of the season while Travis Yell (112), Shane Surette (125) and Steve Surette (152) all finished second.
Winners and local placers:
103: 1. Shannon Constantine (W), 2. Tom Funk (P); 112: 1. Josh Medeiros (Pel), 2. Travis Yell (W) ; 119: 1. Greg Jones (John Stark), 3. Zach Rabel (G'town); 125: 1. Sean Conroy (Westerly) 2. Shane Surette (W), 4. Matt Prescott (G'town); 130: 1. Mike Perruccio (Pel); 135: 1. C.J. Widdifield (Westerly), 3. George Katsaros (W); 140: 1. Dean Nemeroff (G'town), 3. Jonathan Scheidegger (Sanborn), 4. Jake Morton (W); 145: 1. Austin Perreault (Pent), 2. Jake Tannian (W); 152: 1. Talor Caputo (Westerly), 2. Steve Surette (W), 3. Richie Sullivan (Pel), 4. Chris Meuse (Pent); 160: 1. Cory Shortt (Westerly), 4. Brendan Leach (Pent); 171: 1. Peter Koopman (Pent),4. Warren Greeenhalgh (Pel); 189: 1. Josh Kilgore (Milford), 2. Andy Stasiuk (Pent); 215: 1. Jordan Pinzone (Pent), 4. Jared Shennett (W); HVY: 1. Matt Kaplan (Franklin), 3. Eric Gesualdi (G'town)
While Thursday’s 60-14 loss to Warrensburg exposed Smith-Cotton’s youth and inexperience, it reaffirmed the talent of the Tigers’ top wrestlers.
Zach Dake, Trey Taber, Josh Brust and Dakota Proctor justified their state rankings just three weeks before their district tournament begins by going 2-2 against eighth-ranked Warrensburg.
The four grapplers, along with Emily Webster, are currently ranked in the top four in their weight classes for their district — which would put them all in range of qualifying for the state tournament.
But before punching their tickets to Columbia, the girls will need to save their best performances for the end of the year.
“Our district is going to be tough,” Smith-Cotton coach Joel Sherman said. “Even though we have four state-ranked wrestlers, they’re all — besides Taber who’s ranked first in districts — ranked fourth. It makes it tough on them because one mistake, and they could be sitting at home and not at state. We still have a lot of work to do.”
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Ohio
“There’s always going to be people that
don’t agree with women competing in male-dominated sports," says
Crestwood's Paige Nemec, "but I think some people have respect for me
because I think I put in just as much work as the boys.”CLEVELAND,
Ohio -- There have been so many firsts in Paige Nemec's remarkable
wrestling career. This one is going to stick.
Nemec, a senior at Crestwood, last week became the first Ohio girl to win 100 career varsity wrestling matches. Others may follow, but Nemec always will be the trailblazer.
In a region that loves and appreciates wrestling, and annually produces many of the nation's best wrestlers, Nemec's accomplishment is extraordinary. Her career record thus far is 100-30, and all but one match was against boys.
Winning 100 career matches is a benchmark in high school wrestling. What it also symbolizes is that Nemec has gone beyond novelty status.
"There's always going to be people that don't agree with women competing in male-dominated sports, but I think some people have respect for me because I think I put in just as much work as the boys," she said.
"I see myself as a wrestler, not a girl wrestler. I just want people to accept me as a wrestler and not worry about, 'She's a girl, and some guys won't wrestle her.' I don't see any difference at all."
Last year, Nemec was the first Ohio girl to win a match at the district tournament, and this year she could become the first to qualify for the state tournament. A 103-pounder, she is 19-5 with five pins, including a second-place finish at the Kenston Invitational. She always has been a skilled wrestler and has hit the weights hard to add some power.
All this might say something about how far girls have come in high school sports. It says more about the 5-2 dynamo that is Paige Nemec. She's also a 4.0 student and a standout soccer player who scored more than 65 career goals. She should be an inspiration for any girl in any sport, and indeed, several young girls and their parents have sought her advice about wrestling.
Sadly, she won't be wrestling much longer. She has scholarship offers to wrestle for women's teams at Oklahoma City University, Cumberland, Northern Michigan and other schools. Nemec plans to play soccer -- yes, women's soccer -- and pursue a pharmacology degree at Baldwin-Wallace.
She'll be missed on the mats, but she's left her mark.