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DeKALB – The Don Flavin Dual Team Invitational can humble some of the best teams and greatest wrestlers in the state.
The 25th version of the tournament wrapped up Saturday night in DeKalb, with DeKalb dropping its three duals in the Bronze bracket.
The Barbs dropped duals to Lockport (50-20), Naperville Central (45-29) and Barrington (56-21) after losing two of three Friday.
Senior Sean Kolkebeck, who won twice Saturday at 175 pounds, recognized the challenging task he and his team took on.
“I think as a team, obviously we wrestled some teams that are ranked higher than us,” he said. “And I think we’ve got to realize rankings don’t matter. Anyone can go out there and beat a kid they’re supposed to beat. The character comes out when you got to wrestle a kid who you shouldn’t beat and is ranked higher than you.
“You can’t teach character. Coaches can’t give you character however passionate they are, and they’re great coaches. I love them. They help us in the room, but the character has to come from you, and you have to dig deep in those matches.”
Kolkebeck, Erick Rivas (190), Nick Waddle (215) and Jaden Bradley (106) had early wins against Minooka, but the Barbs dropped their next nine bouts.
“From a positive standpoint, we got some guys back who haven’t been wrestling, so it’s good to see them in the lineup,” Barbs coach Sam Hiatt said. “We had a bunch of freshmen and sophomores in the lineup, and the guys wrestled tough. Guys that were first-time varsity, they had to step in against the best teams in the state.
“We need to refocus, and we’ve got about a month left in the season until regionals.”
Waddle and Bradley both earned their second wins of the night by fall in the loss to Naperville Central. Freshman Julian Hartwig (113) earned a 19-3 tech fall win against senior Jack Schwartz.
Hudson Ikens (150) won by fall at 5:30 against Naperville Central’s CJ Bierman. Cam Matthews (157) followed with a pin at 3:41 against Yusuf Sikander.
“Whatever wins or losses, you have to learn from everything, and sometimes you learn more from losses,” Kolkebeck said. “We have a younger team, so this is a big year for leadership. Seniors got to take a kind of ‘this is how we do things around here’ and kind of set the standard. It comes with time.
“We’ve got to build that tradition.”
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Mike Hodge (144) pinned Maddux Orozco at 4:22 to get the team one of those rare wins in the middle of the lineup against Barrington.
Kolkebeck downed Dylan DeLeon at 2:17, and Elvis Mora rallied for a 9-7 decision over Aaron for DeKalb’s fourth win of the dual and 13th on the night.
“We’ve been making progress,” Hiatt said. “They’ve been coachable and making adjustments and everything. We’ll get back in there on Monday and keep working and getting better.”