Red Oak finishes 8th at Atlantic Duals
ATLANTIC — The Red Oak wrestling team finished eighth at Saturday’s Trojan Dual Tournament, but one wrestler was able to reach a milestone during the tournament.
Geoff Sellers moved to second place all-time on the school’s win list when he defeated Dalton Hanson of Sioux City North by a 12-1 major decision in the 126-lbs. match.
“Geoff Sellers wrestled one of the most complete matches I’ve seen him wrestle this year and he just made this kid not look very good,” Red Oak Head Coach Tiegan Podliska said about Sellers win against Hanson.
Sellers had a 5-0 record during the day Saturday and now has 123 career wins. He entered Saturday tied for second with 118 career wins, along with Brett Sandholm.
Sellers was one of three wrestlers to get wins versus Sioux City North, the eventual winner of the Trojan Dual Tournament. Tanner Mertz won via pinfall against Alex Torno at 106-lbs. and Dustin Jones had a forfeit win at 195-lbs. Red Oak lost the dual 58-19.
For their efforts, both Sellers and Mertz were named to the dual tournament team.
Red Oak had three dual losses by less than 10 points at the tournament Saturday. Red Oak lost to Riverside 49-45, Denison-Schleswig 42-49 and Carroll 41-36.
“In a lot of those duals, we’re winning six of those matches,” Podliska said. “The problem is, the six or seven matches we’re losing, we lose by fall.”
Against Denison-Schleswig, Mertz and Sellers both scored pinfall wins. Mertz pinned Josef Rogers in 40 seconds, while Sellers pinned Parker Preul at the end of the second period.
Bailey Akers, Nick Leinen, Tanner Allensworth and Tyler Terry all picked upwins for Red Oak against Denison-Schleswig.
Most of the Tigers losses against the Monarchs came via pinfall.
“Like I said before, we’re a relatively inexperienced team, so we make some mistakes and they’re going to cost us,” Podliska said. “We’re continuing to build off those mistakes. Right now, it’s not exactly what we want to see.”
Red Oak also lost to Bondurant-Farrar, the second place team, 50-28. Mertz, Sellers, Leinen, Terry and Dakota Petty all picked up wins. Mertz had the highlight with a 24 second pinfall victory over Trace Harken.
“Mertz ran the moves that he’s been running. He’s been hitting tilts. I haven’t seen him hit many tilts before this year, but that’s one thing he really focused on in the offseason,” Podliska said about Mertz.
Petty, who according to Podliska had a good day as well, won via pinfall over Justice Hitchcock at 1:15. Leinen had a 8-0 win over Tyler Heinrich at 182-lbs. and Terry pinned Austin Sullivan at 1:21.
Sellers meanwhile defeated Colton Parsons in 57 seconds. Sellers is now 23-2 for the season.
“He’s going to continue to progress,” Podliska said about Sellers. “There’s no reason he can’t go well into the state tournament and not be wearing one of those medals around his neck.”
Red Oak began January by splitting a double-dual against St. Albert and Glenwood at Glenwood High School, last Thursday.
The Tigers defeated St. Albert 48-30, but lost to Glenwood 72-3.
Notable wins included Sellers, who won via technical fall over Martin Shudak at 126-lbs., as well as Austin Streicher who won a 14-4 majority decision against Jeremy Sindelar and Terry who won a 4-2 decision over Andersen Kouri.
Clay Selberg, Caleb Orme, Austin Hale, Allensworth, Jon Sands and Mitch Hilder picked up forfeit wins for Red Oak.
Leinen scored the lone win in the dual against Glenwood as he won via a 9-2 decision against Dillon Wallace in the 182-lbs. match.
Sellers lost in overtime 6-4 to Sam Jameson.
Red Oak will be back in action Tuesday when they hit the road to compete against Bedford/Lenox and Griswold in Bedford.
Saturday, the team travels to Adel to take part in the Adel-DeSoto Minburn tournament.