Charlie Olson wins first 3 matches at Flavin after return from injury

DeKALB – On the first day of practice during the second week of the season, sophomore Charlie Olson got his hand stepped on.

On Friday, Olson returned to the Sycamore lineup, winning all three of his matches at 113 pounds in the Dan Cliffe Bracket of The Flavin at DeKalb.

“He was out a month after getting his wrist stepped on and broke,” Sycamore coach Randy Culton said. “He didn’t do a lot (while sidelined). He ran. On Tuesday in a JV tournament he won. He wrestled a wrestle off with (freshman) Sawyer Davis who is 12-3 or 12-4 and took third (at the 59th Rus Erb Tournament on Dec. 20-21). Charlie (Olson) came in one year older, a little stronger and won it. He’s one of my young veterans. It’s a good problem to have two good kids.”

Sycamore dropped its opening match to Yorkville, 50-18, and was on the wrong side of a 41-30 decision to Glenbard West. The Spartans wrapped their day early in the afternoon with a 51-25 win over Libertyville.

“We were flat and we got lucky on the last dual just because they had (some) things,” Culton said. “So hopefully we’ll come back tomorrow at the same time and we’ll wrestle more of the team. We were very flat. These guys are better than what they are and that’s basically it. We can’t be soft.”

Olson credited his partners in the room for continuing to push him while he was sidelined.

“When the doctor said I could get the cast off, I got it off,” he said. “I could condition and ride the bike and stuff so I would say I was in good condition for today.”

Opening with a tech fall victory over Yorkville’s Landon Jenkins, Olson proceeded to pin Glenbard West’s Cristian Lopez in his second dual of the morning.

“(Lopez) came off strong and scored on me first,” Olson said. “But then I started to take control, riding legs.”

Olson finished his day by pinning Libertyville’s Riggs Mitran in 2:49.

“Hopefully we can get some more wins under our belt tomorrow,” Olson said. “We didn’t wrestle well today.”

At 175 pounds, Cooper Bode was among the bright spots for the Spartans.

After losing on a tech fall against Yorkville’s Luke Zook, Bode picked up strong victories against his final two opponents. Bode also dropped a 12-2 major decision to Zook, at the 2023 Flavin. Zook placed third in the state at 170 in Class 3A last season.

Bode won by tech fall against Glenbard West’s Soren Myra. Then he pinned Libertville’s James Scanio in 1:24.

“I started off with a tough match and I think I wrestled well, but I didn’t finish very well in some positions so that is something I need to improve on,” Bode said. “And then after that I just kind of got after it and went out and got (a tech fall and a pin) so it was an overall decent day, but there are things to improve on though.”Sycamore

Carson West (106), Michael Olson (120), Tyler Lockhard (126), Jayden Dohogne (138) and Adam Carrick (190) each went 2-1 for the Spartans. Sycamore won three of its matches by forfeit.

“There are some really, really good teams here and obviously we know some of these big teams are going to be tough to beat, especially the bigger 3A teams,” Bode said. “But I think that we could’ve done a lot better than we did today. I don’t think we wrestled to the best that we could’ve. I think maybe if one or two matches go differently and then maybe we don’t lose two.”