Sports
Wrestling: Ohio Places in Top-10 at Southern Scuffle
By: Nick Hurst
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The Ohio Bobcats wrestling team is now at the mid-way point of its season.
The Bobcats took 10th out of 23 teams in the Southern Scuffle in Chattanooga, Tennessee, which ended Monday. The Southern Scuffle is a two day event; Ohio had five of its wrestlers advance to compete in both days. The Green and White’s highest finishes came in the heavyweight division (285 pounds). Standout sophomore Jeremy Johnson took fifth and senior Andy Hartshorn placed sixth in the big boys’ class. Ohio’s next top finisher was Nick Purdue who took eighth in the 174-pound weight class.
Ohio Coach Joel Greenlee was pleased with the performance of the team.
“I think we had some tough competition but I thought we wrestled pretty well,” Greenlee said.
Ohio faced some familiar faces in the Southern Scuffle, including Chattanooga and Appalachian State who Ohio saw in dual match play. The two schools finished ahead of Ohio in the final standings.
Greenlee believes the Bobcats are taking the right steps toward the future.
“I think we have gotten better since the Reno Tournament. Each and every guy is making improvements,” Greenlee added.
Ohio will look to keep improving as they gear into the second half of the schedule in which the vast majority of the meets are dual matches.
Ohio will have five home matches in the second part of the schedule and will be playing host to the MAC tournament.
Ohio will be taking another long break for their next competition, a dual home match against Mid-American Conference foe Northern Illinois on January 13. Greenlee feels that the breaks have been beneficial for the team.
“For us it’s a much needed break. We wrestled a lot of matches during the Christmas break. Some guys were wrestling four to five matches in a short period of time,” Greenlee said.
Ohio is still searching for their first MAC team win of the season. Ohio has lost its last two MAC matches.