Sparta captures MVC title with 40-30 victory over Tomah

For the first time since the 2010-11 season, your Spartans are MVC champions.  As they have all year, the Spartans won close matches and big matches to topple Tomah 40-30.  They won nine of 14 matches including a string of eight straight from 285 through 145 to put the match out of reach.

The chess match started early as Tomah bumped Jordan Reisinger up to 220 where he picked up a quick six points.  In response to Reisinger moving up, Logan Degenhardt moved up to 285 and gave up a lot of weight in the process.  Despite the weight disadvantage, Degenhardt picked up three big points during a 6-0 win.  Corey Zimmerman followed that up with a 6-3 victory at 106.  Then came the first truly big victory of the night.  In a match that was projected to be one of the better bouts, Christian Lamon made relatively quick work of Katen Moser winning by pin in 1:46.  With Lamon’s pin, the Spartans would take the lead and never give it up.

Collin Gartner followed Lamon’s big pin with another victory at 120.  John Roddick faced a very tough freshman in Tomah’s Hunter Pierce, but was too much in a 15-7 major decision victory.  No victory may have been bigger than Jaden Winchel’s pin of Logan Pollack at 3:14 in the 132 match.  This was a match that Tomah almost needed to win and expected to win, but Winchel brought his best and picked up a huge second period victory.  After picking up the pin, Winchel jumped to his feet and pumped his fists toward the Spartans bench as you could feel the Spartans beginning to put this dual away.

The elder Winchel, Dylan, followed his little brother’s big win with another victory at 138.  At 145, Brock Polhamus won his teams eighth straight match of the dual to put Sparta up 34-6.  At 152, Tomah’s Collin Sampson pinned Haydn Bernett in overtime.  It was a bit controversial as Bernett turned Sampson onto his back a good foot or two from the circle, but with Sampson’s feet falling outside the circle on the edge of the mat, the official called the wrestlers off the mat.  It was a little questionable as the only portion of Sampson’s body out of bounds was his legs from the knees down while Bernett was completely on the mat.  None of that mattered though as one match later, Logan VanTassel picked up a third period pin of Dalton Pottebaum to put the Spartans up 40-12.  That win by VanTassel would clinch the outright MVC title for the Spartans.

The final three matches all went to Tomah with Ben Linzmeier picking up a pin over Walker Polhamus in 1:30 at 170 and Seth Fryett pinning Keith Ender in 3:02 at 182.  The final match of the night was won by Tomah’s Gerald Pemberton via an injury default over Lucas Peters.  As you can see, Tomah won five of seven matches from 152 through 220.  Starting the match at 220 was about as good a weight as the Spartans could have hoped for.  It allowed them to jump out to a big lead and wrestle with more confidence as the match wore on.

Let’s look at the individual results.

220  –  Jordan Reisinger (Tomah) pinned Ethan Robbins in 0:48
285  –  Logan Degenhardt defeated Ryan Sutherland (Tomah) 6-0
106  –  Corey Zimmerman defeated Tommy Repka (Tomah) 6-3
113  –  Christian Lamon pinned Katen Moser (Tomah) in 1:46
120  –  Collin Gartner defeats Simon Joseph (Tomah) 8-2
126  –  John Roddick defeats Hunter Pierce (Tomah) 15-7
132  –  Jaden Winchel pins Logan Pollack (Tomah) in 3:14
138  –  Dylan Winchel defeats Casey Curran (Tomah) 5-3
145  –  Brock Polhamus pins Lucas Dubord (Tomah) in 1:58
152  –  Collin Sampson (Tomah) pins Haydn Bernett in 6:29 of OT
160  –  Logan VanTassel pins Dalton Pottebaum (Tomah) in 4:15
170  –  Ben Linzmeier (Tomah) pinned Walker Polhamus in 1:30
182  –  Seth Fryett (Tomah) pinned Keith Ender in 3:02
195  –  Gerald Pemberton (Tomah) won by injury default over Lucas Peters in 1:00
FINAL:  Sparta 40 – Tomah 30

The win pushes the Spartans’ record to 13-4 overall and 6-0 in the MVC.  It is the seventh MVC title for the Spartans and their first since the 2010-11 season.  After tonight’s dual, John Roddick, Jaden Winchel, Brock Polhamus, Dylan Winchel and Logan Degenhardt all finished the year undefeated in conference action.  Christian Lamon, Logan VanTassel and Walker Polhamus all finished at 5-1 in the MVC.

The Spartans are now off until Saturday, February 15th when they return to begin the tournament season with regionals at West Salem.  Congrats Spartans on a well-earned victory over rival Tomah and a well-earned MVC title.