Wrestling: Lincoln-Way West beats Plainfield South to advance to the dual team state tournament

OAK FOREST – It’s a safe bet that the dual team sectional meets have been one of Brian Glynn’s least-favorite dates on the wrestling calendar the past few seasons.

For six-straight years from 2011-16, Lincoln-Way West was ranked among the state’s top teams in Class 2A but only won once in that round to earn a trip to the quarterfinals, falling to a squad that either finished first or second in the other five years.

But it was a different story for the Warriors in their debut in the dual team sectional in Class 3A on Tuesday in Oak Forest when they met up with Plainfield South, which was competing in the event for the first time in its history.

West jumped out to an early advantage and went 10-4 in matches won to help it claim a 50-15 victory over the Cougars, which advanced it to Saturday’s 9 a.m. quarterfinals against Wheeling, who beat Huntley, 40-27, at Rockford East.

“We’ve got a good group of seniors who have seen us lose this the last three years against teams that wrestled for the state championship,” Glynn said. “So this was good, especially with us being in our first year in 3A and making the trip downstate. We wrestled pretty good, all things considered. I was pretty pleased with the way that we came out.”

The Warriors (22-3) received a 6-3 decision from Trevor Schmidt over Adrian Cervantes in the opener at 182 and then got consecutive pins from Robert Noga (195 pounds), Jake Dudeck (220) and Nick Skentzos (285) to establish quick control over the Cougars.

After Garrett Geigner won 5-0 over David Plata at 106, Payton Geigner (113) got a pin and Chris Kennedy (120) followed with a 6-2 win over Zach Kolb.

Andrew Cervantes (126) edged Tom Buell 7-5 for the Cougars’ first win and after Gehrig Simon (132) won by technical fall, South’s Johnny Hernandez (138) beat Jake Pakula 11-6.

In the last four matches, West received pins from Joey Schloegel (145) and Josh Bohne (160) while South got a pin from Erik Santiago (152) and a 9-7 victory from Will Johnston over Tanner Lorenz in the final match.

“We had a hard week of practice and coach Glynn really kept us focused to make sure that we could make it to team state,” Bohne said. “We haven’t missed a beat at all and I think we’re ready to go to state and can make some noise. We have a really special team and it’s nice to get this chance. We’re a close-knit group of guys and to be able to go to state and have a chance to place is an awesome thing.”

While his squad came up short in their initial visit to the dual team sectional, Cougars coach Jason Acevedo realizes that just getting there was a big step and now they can build on it.

“Getting here capped a successful season since there were only 16 teams who were wrestling today,” Acevedo said. “But it’s just the first step. We used to have the goal of winning a regional and now it’s not just about winning that, but winning this dual and moving forward. These seniors have laid a successful foundation for us and our younger kids are buying in. As young as we are, we’re going to experience this again moving forward.”

In the Class 2A sectional at the same site, Lemont earned its second state trip in three years when it claimed a 43-33 victory over Brother Rice. Coach John St. Clair’s Indians (18-4) will meet Cahokia, which beat Mattoon 37-33 at Mahomet-Seymour, in a 9 a.m. quarterfinal.

“Any time you get young kids coming in, you don’t how they’ll react, but these guys have been around wrestling for long so they’re already battle-tested,” St. Clair said. “And I think it’s a testament to the seniors that we have on the team. They could say that these are new kids and could shun them but that was definitely not the case. They all came together and are having a lot of fun.”

Damyen Gothard (182) started things with a major decision and after the Crusaders won three in a row, Kyle Schickel (106) got a fall, Paul McGrath (113) won by forfeit and Drew Nash (120) also recorded a fall.

The Indians got consecutive falls from Grant LaDuke (132) and Kyle Zator (138) and then wrapped things up with a pin from Egan Berta (152) and a 6-3 win by Jake Kirkman (160).

“I’m really excited for our team and especially all of the seniors to get another opportunity to wrestle and extend our season a little longer,” Berta said. “We have some freshmen who will get good experience going to team state. I think we have the people to win our first match and maybe even get to the finals. I’m looking forward to it and it should be fun.”