Sports
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Wrestlers taken down by Ott’s alma mater February 6, 2009
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Mike Lumetta Reporter
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t’s more frustrating than disappointing because for whatever reason we seem to be having a lot of bad luck with kids getting sick or hurt,” said St. Louis U. High wrestling coach Jon Ott, referring to the large number of casualties that have plagued his team throughout January and continued this week. Although senior captain Mike Donovan and junior Peter Everson returned, junior Andrew Danter suffered a shoulder injury while drilling Granby rolls in practice, and senior captain John Boehm (160) was out sick. The recent setbacks greatly impaired the TSLbills in their 39-27 loss to DeSmet, the alma mater of Ott and varsity assistant coach Todd Clements. The match opened with a battle between two 112-pound freshmen. SLUH’s Nick Danter, wrestling varsity for the MCC dual, used his stronger takedown technique to win 14-12. Danter had a dangerous moment late in the match when, after he went up 14-7 with two nearfall points on a barbed wire,
the DeSmet 112 reversed him to his back. Danter hung on and avoided a pin as time ran out. Junior George Staley followed with a win at 119, cradling and pinning his opponent before the one-minute mark. Freshman Will Whitney (130) secured his 14-8 win with a late barbed wire turn for three nearfall. Two matches later, Donovan prevailed in his return from a shoulder injury with a third period pin. As the DeSmet 140 tried to stand up, Donovan lifted him with a double leg and took him to his back. He held his opponent for the fall, putting SLUH ahead 18-10. Donovan said that he “just came out there fired up” in his first match back. The match began to slip from the Jr. Bills’ grasp following that win. At 145, senior captain Kevin Staed was slammed to the mat as the ref whistled to end the second period, aggravating the neck injury that had kept him out of action for a month. Staed had to retire from the match. At 152, junior David Lopez faced off against DeSmet senior Jim Layton, a fifthplace medal winner last year at state. Layton defeated sophomore Espen Conley, SLUH’s
regular 152, at the Spartan and at the Vianney Tournament. Ott moved Conley up to challenge another difficult wrestler in DeSmet 160 Dan Bergjans rather than start rookie sophomore Phil Hogrebe against Bergjans. The gamble did not pay off at 152 as Layton hit numerous takedowns virtually at will and eventually pinned Lopez with a Turk. “I figured I’d put in Lopez and take the chance that he’d catch (Layton) with some sort of throw and pin him,” Ott said. The 160-pound bout started slowly with a first period consumed nearly entirely by handfighting. At the beginning of the second, Conley won the toss and picked bottom. He worked his way around to a sprawl position out front and tried to circle, but Bergjans hung desperately on his leg. Conley managed to hook Bergjans’ near ankle and slowly break his grip for the reversal and a 2-0 lead. With Bergjans down to begin the third, Conley let him up in order to wrestle from neutral. Bergjans tried to shoot a few times, but Conley sprawled out each time and circled
see TTO, 14
Racquetball: full hearts, clear eyes, can’t lose Spencer Rusch Reporter
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he St. Louis U. High racquetball team improved to 8-0 with Tuesday’s wellfought 6-1 victory over the Kirkwood Pioneers. The Babybabybills began the match well with a victory as Kirkwood’s No. 6 Mike Dyer was sick and junior Mark Kissel won by forfeit. Kissel is one of four Junior Bills who remain undefeated in league play, and is the only player that has not been legitimately threatened. Doubles team Scott Hack and Nick Eshelman faced Paul Roth and backup Patrick Day (who was filling in for a sick Dennis O’Grady). Team Hackman needed a tiebreaker to defeat the Kirkwood pair in the teams’ last meeting, but the makeshift Kirkwood duo killed next to nothing this time around. The two seniors played very lackadaisically, but didn’t need their “A” game in a 15-5, 15-2 victory. No. 4 senior Andrew Connor took on
Kirkwood’s Tommy Bottchen next. Connor No. 2 Kevin Kissel bounced back from a started by establishing a good service rota- weekend loss with a convincing win over tion and finishing easy set-ups, but Bottchen Payne Stoddart. Kissel came out firing, and would not quit. Connor also maintained good Stoddart floundered with extremely lazy play. court position, but BotKissel played down to tchen strung out points Stoddart’s level for a and hit dink shots to rally few points in the first alongside his opponent. match, but his lead was Connor held off his opnever in danger. He won ponent in the end, 15-9, 15-8, 15-4. 15-13. No. 3 senior Senior John DuchClay Newberry was ardt battled Kirkwood also firing on all cylinNo. 5 Charlie Pepin. ders for the first game Duchardt has tended against John Malley. to rely on his speed to Newberry’s momentum wear down opponents, did not carry over into but Pepin matched his the second, though, as quickness. Duchardt he began to leave shots stuck to a game of dinks up, with Malley easily and passes, often leav- Can you see me now? Goggled senior Scott Hack burying those set-ups. ing the ball too high, dials in during a doubles win over Kirkwood. Newberry fought valallowing opportunities for Pepin. Duchardt iantly to keep his red-hot opponent in the back cashed in on enough of Pepin’s mistakes to of the court, but lost 15-4, 11-15, 8-11. squeaked by with a 15-11, 15-13 win. see WOODWORK, 9 photo by connor blanquart