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CHRISTENSEN WINS CBC TITLE, ROAD TO STATES UP NEXT
The Greenon Knights Wrestling team placed 5 wrestler's in the top 6 spots, including Kevin Christensen with a first place finish and Garrett Lay with a 2nd place finish.
It's been quite a journey the past three season's for Senior wrestler Kevin Christensen. A quick glance at his resume shows that he's the only 3-time state qualifier in school history, the all time school record holder for wins in a career (currently at 152), and he is tied for the best finish (4th) in school history at the State Touranment.
With the completion of the regular season, the critical post season portion of the wrestling season began last weekend as the CBC held their league tournament at Kenton Ridge High School last Saturday. Christensen entered the tournament hoping to add one more achievement to his resume - a CBC championship. In his three previous season's, Christensen finished 2nd, 2nd, and 3rd at the CBC meet. Christensen entered the CBC tournament as the number one seed in the 135 lb weight class and his final journey proved to be a successful one as he captured first place in convincing fashion by defeating Jacob Gambill of Miami East 9-3 in the Championship Match. Christensen jumped out to leads of 2-0, 4-0 and 6-1 before cruising to victory in the final period. The win improved his record this season to 30-3 and his career record to 152-20. Coach Justin Vondenberg commented afterwards "I thought he was going to have a tough match in the final's against Miami East's Jacob Gambill (who came into the match with a 30-3 record) but I was wrong. That was one of those time's where I was glad that I was wrong". Christensen got to the finals by defeating Jordan Krebs of Tipp City 22-5 and winning by default against Graham's Joe Newland.
Greenon almost had another 1st place finish in the 112 lb division as Garrett Lay, who came into the tournament as the # 1 seed in his weight class, lost a close match in the championship match to Graham's Cordell Longstreath by a score of 6-4. Lay got to the finals by pining Alex Russell of Shawnee in his 1st round match and Steven Wray of Indian Lake in this 2nd round match. Lay's record for the season is 36-5.
Other wrestler's who placed for Greenon were Casey Wells, Matt Wolf, and Nick Anthony. Wells grabbed a hard luck 4th place finish. He won his first round match by pinning Dukie Sherman of Urbana. The win improved his record for the season to 34-6, but in his second round match while wrestling Jeb Pencil of Northwestern he suffered a neck injury that contributed to a 10-7 loss. The injury forced Wells to default his next match for 3rd/4th place.
In the 171 lb weight class, Nick Anthony took 6th place for the Knights as he bounced back from a first round loss to pin Joey Boehler of Indian Lake. Anthony lost his final match to Jake McGillivary of Miami East to finish in 6th place.
The final placer for the Knights was Matt Wolf. Wolf finished in 5th place for the Knights in the 275 lb weight class. Wolf lost his first match to Thomas Taylor of Indian Lake, but he came back to pin John Clary of Ben Logan to take 5th. The pin improved his record for the season to 20-15.
The Knight's wrestling season now moves onto the Sectional, District and State Tournament the next 3 weekends. Greenon has three wrestler's expected to make some noise in the post season as Garrett Lay (36-5), Kevin Christensen (30-3), and Casey Wells (34-6) were all predicted to finish in the top nine spots in the state by the very respected "Brakeman Report". The Brakeman report predicted a 5th place finish for Christensen, a 7th place finish for Wells, and a 9th place finish for Lay.
Photo's from the CBC meet can be viewed by CLICKING HERE.
Complete results for every team can be viewed by CLICKING HERE.