Columbus East’s Reece Fisher and Columbus North’s Jaedin Richards face off during their 138-pound match at Columbus North High School. Tommy Walker (For The Republic)
Three bouts into Wednesday night’s crosstown dual, sixth-ranked Columbus East was leading Columbus North 10-3, and the Bull Dogs were bidding to cut into the lead.
The Olympians’ Nate Anderson had other ideas. The sophomore scored a takedown in the Sudden Victory extra period to pull out a win against Jason Shuey at 132 pounds. That sent East on a run of nine wins in the final 10 contested bouts and a 58-12 victory.
“I think I could have done better, but I’m excited that I pulled through in overtime,” Anderson said. “I could have gotten into more shots, but I came out with the ‘W,’ and I’m happy. After Noah lost, I felt like if I lost, too, it would be a streak. I wanted to end it before it started, so I just wanted to win the match.”
Shuey pinned Anderson in 27 seconds in last year’s regular-season meeting and went on to qualify for semistate at 120.
“Nate Anderson hasn’t beat that kid ever,” East coach Chris Cooper said. “They’ve wrestled multiple times, and honestly, it really hasn’t been close. We talked to Nate a lot about being in our room and the things that it does and thinking of being able to go out and beat a good kid like that, and he did tonight.”
Following Anderson’s decision, the Olympians’ Reece Fisher pinned Jaedin Richards in 1 minute, 42 seconds at 138, and Kenton Wilson pinned Josiah Green in 1:55 at 145. East’s Tony Ruiz-Tapia then came from behind in the third period to pull out a 7-5 decision against Liam Phillips at 152.
The Olympians’ second-ranked Kade Law pinned Luke Spurgeon in 4:52 at 160, and Jordan Sutton pinned Keller DeSpain in 1:22 at 170. North stopped the bleeding with a 6-2 decision from Jared Slocum against Tristan Statler at 182.
East then got pins from 10th-ranked Jaden Durnil in 2:08 against Bryce Abner at 195, 10th-ranked Tommy Morrill in 1:38 against Alexander Lozano at 220 and seventh-ranked Ashton Hartwell in :38 against Bryan Avila at 285.
“I want out there and had my stuff and felt pretty good,” Hartwell said. “I think we competed very well. Some of the spots, we could have done a little bit better. We wanted to try to give them a goosegg, but we didn’t get that done tonight. There’s always room for improvement.”
The match ended at 106 with the Bull Dogs’ Liam Curfman winning by forfeit. It began at 113 with the Olympians’ 10th-ranked Liam Krueger winning by forfeit.
In the first contested match, East’s Braden Isbell scored a 16-4 major decision against Bryce Hawkins. North then got on the board when Justice Thornton claimed a 3-2 decision against the Olympians’ Noah Lykins, who is ranked No. 16 at 120.
“It’s always tough because guys on that team and our team are friends,” Cooper said. ‘They grew up together and maybe were on middle school teams together and things like that. So there’s always that little extra emotion that you have to get settled down for matches like this.”
North coach Matt Joyce was proud of the way his team competed.
“The kids up and down the lineup wrestled really hard,” Joyce said. “(East is) a tough team. They’re ranked No. 6 in the state for a reason. But our kids, I’m really impressed with the way that we went at them. We wrestled them hard, regardless of the situation.
“We competed against them this year better than we’ve ever competed against them,” he added. “We have a team here that is better than we’ve had in quite a long time. So I’m really proud of the work that these athletes are putting out on the mat.”
