VISAA's top ranked Cardinals win second consecutive Catholic state duals championship at Benedictine
The Cardinal grapplers dominated the competition on Saturday at the second annual Commonwealth Catholic Classic Tournament in Richmond and brought home yet another first place trophy. The Cardinals were the clear leaders in the tournament among the field of eight Catholic High Schools in Virginia with an overall team score of 197, which was 41 points ahead of second place and host Benedictine High School. The pride of parents, coaches and teammates abounded as Ireton’s wrestlers placed in the top six spots for each weight class.
Five Ireton wrestlers stood proudly atop the award podium to claim their individual first place gold medal. Four third-place winners, three fourth-place winners, one fifth-place winner and one sixth-place winner. Earning first-place were Senior Elliot Mondragon at 103lbs, who pinned all of his opponents in the first period of his matches and was also awarded by participating coaches as the “Outstanding Wrestler” among the 103–145lb weight classes.
Teammates rallied around junior Darcy Gomez as he won his first championship bout with a 9-0 major decision against the #5 ranked VISAA wrestler from Benedictine. Darcy’s standing among 112lb VISAA wrestlers has improved as a result of his championship win to the #5 spot. Topping his two prior tournament silver medals was the third champion, sophomore Nick Womach, who beat his 130lb Bishop O’Connell opponent in his championship bout with a score of 10-6. Nick also achieved the fasted pin of the day in his first bout of the day against his Roanoke Catholic opponent, who he pinned in :33.
In a possible preview of the VISAA State title bout for 140lbs, Ireton’s fourth champion, senior Ricky Baier pinned the #2 ranked VISAA wrestler from Bishop Sullivan in 3:12. The Cardinals’ fifth champion junior Andrew Lutterloh also pinned all of his opponents including his final bout against his opponent from John Paul the Great, who he pinned in 2:19.
Among the four Cardinal grapplers who won their final match to claim third-place were junior Andrew Baehre at 135 lbs, who earned his second third-place medal this season with a 8-3 decision in his final bout against his PVI opponent. Also winning his second third-place medal this season was junior Michael Rodriguez at 145 lbs, who bested his PVI opponent with a 16-6 major decision. Junior Gibson Hawk also earned his second third-place medal this season, but did so by pinning his 160lb Benedictine opponent in 2:19. The final third-place winner was junior Andrew Bladen, who earned his first medal of this season by pinning his 171lb opponent from John Paul the Great in 4:49.
Receiving their first tournament medal this season were senior Arslan Ryspekov at 119lbs and sophomore Jeff Severini at 125lbs, who each placed fourth in their weight classes. Earning his second fourth-place medal this season was junior Ben Nagao at 152lbs, who also placed fourth earlier this year at the Ireton Holiday Classic. Sophomore Jimmy Keegan at heavy weight and Tommy Fessahaye at 189lbs also placed for the Cambridge Road crew, who placed fifth and sixth respectively on Saturday. “Our entire team wrestled well today, I am proud of the effort.” said the Cards’ head man, Don Dight. “Our guys wanted to win this and each knew we needed their contributions to get Bishop Ireton a team championship at the Commonwealth Catholic Classic Tournament.”
The final team scores are provided below:
Bishop Ireton – 197
Benedictine – 156
Bishop O’Connell – 149
Paul VI – 148.5
Pope John Paul the Great – 131
Bishop Sullivan – 76
Roanoke Catholic – 43
Seton School – 19
Earlier last week the Cardinal grapplers fought valiantly in a tough loss to Good Counsel, a team to watch in the WCAC tournament, in their dual meet on the Martin Luther King holiday. Junior Andrew Bahre, and Senior Co-Captain, Ricky Baier, provided the highlight reel footage in that meet, leading the team by pinning each of their opponents. Andrew’s pin came with 1:43 gone in the first period as he demonstrated technical prowess with a quick takedown and solid offensive work leading up to his early fall. Ricky was extremely active, scoring several takedowns and controlling the action as he methodically proceeded to victory. They were joined in victory by Gibson Hawk and Elliot Mondragon, each of whom won by forfeit. A number of other Ireton wrestlers turned in excellent performances against very strong opponents, many ranked at the top of the WCAC, some in Maryland and a few nationally. This is just the first encounter with these tough opponents. With three weeks of practice and tune-ups remaining, we’ll likely see many of these same bouts in the WCAC tournament. Good Counsel will host the conference battle on February 5. We’ll also see them along with other nationally ranked ranked wrestlers in St Alban’s Tournament on February 11-12, and again at National Preps, 25-26 February.
Next up for Ireton will be on Friday (January 28) against IAC schools Georgetown Prep and Landon. Fridays match will be held at Georgetown Preparatory School (10900 Rockville Pike, North Bethesda, MD 20852) at 4:30pm. On Saturday (January 29)the squad will host Norfolk Collegiate, Bullis, and Bishop Sullivan. This quad meet will be Ireton’s last home match of the season and as such it will be “Senior Day”. There will be a ceremony honoring our departing seniors before the last match of the day. Wrestling will start on Saturday at 10:00am in Godly Gym.
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