Redmen 4th at NOL tournament

By BRAD FRANK
Gazette Sports Editor

Belle­vue senior Zack Miller, top, faces Willard’s Johnny Her­nan­dez in the third-place match of the 145-pound weight class Sat­ur­day in the North­ern Ohio League Wrestling Cham­pi­onships. (Gazette photo by Brad Frank)

The Belle­vue Red­men landed a fourth-place fin­ish Sat­ur­day in the North­ern Ohio League Wrestling Cham­pi­onships, as Belle­vue High School served as host in the school’s gymnasium.

San­dusky, in its sec­ond sea­son as a mem­ber of the league, won its first-ever NOL wrestling title Sat­ur­day, end­ing Norwalk’s reign as two-time defend­ing NOL cham­pion. Columbian took third.

The final stand­ings announced Sat­ur­day at the tour­na­ment listed Shelby in fourth and Belle­vue in fifth, but a scor­ing error was dis­cov­ered Mon­day morn­ing, so the teams’ posi­tions in the final stand­ings were switched.

Belle­vue recorded 209 points Sat­ur­day, nar­rowly edg­ing Shelby’s 200 for the fourth spot.

“I thought we didn’t have our best show­ing,” Belle­vue coach Paul Zol­man said. “There was some kids who had good days and some kids who didn’t have their best days. We’ve done better.

“We’ll take these last few weeks of the sea­son and try to make the best of it.”

The NOL Cham­pi­onships were wres­tled in a pool-style for­mat Sat­ur­day, where each wrestler faces all oppo­nents in his weight class in five con­sec­u­tive rounds before one last round deter­mines indi­vid­ual placing.

Belle­vue had one indi­vid­ual cham­pion Sat­ur­day, as sopho­more heavy­weight Grant Moyer won his first ever NOL title in the 285-pound weight class.

“Grant wres­tled well,” Zol­man said. “He has been a com­peti­tor at every tour­na­ment he’s wres­tled. He gives it all. That’s been show­ing through­out the sea­son, not just today [Saturday].

“It was good because he got a title to show for it, espe­cially for a sophomore.”

Earn­ing runner-up fin­ishes for the Red­men were senior Ryan Veliz at 132 and fresh­man Collin Adkins at 120.

Veliz was edged by Columbian’s Derik Kopp for first place, los­ing in a 7–6 deci­sion in the finals, a match he led 5–3 at one point.

“That’s no small feat going against the Kopp boy from Columbian, a state qual­i­fier,” Zol­man said of Veliz. He [Kopp] is a very solid wrestler.

“Ryan wres­tled a strong match. He just came up a lit­tle short at the end. He has noth­ing to be ashamed of.”

Tak­ing third in the league for Belle­vue was sopho­more Chris Har­ris at 126, senior Zack Miller at 145 and fresh­man Jared Hoy at 170.

The Red­men have one more reg­u­lar sea­son match on their 2012–13 sched­ule, as they will wrestling a tri-match at San­dusky with Oak Har­bor on Friday.

Bellevue’s next tour­na­ment com­pe­ti­tion will be a Divi­sion II North­west Dis­trict sec­tional, which will begin Fri­day, Feb. 15 at the Stroh Cen­ter on the cam­pus of Bowl­ing Green State University.

Team Stand­ings
1. San­dusky 328; 2. Nor­walk 307; 3. Columbian 259; 4. Belle­vue 209; 5. Shelby 200; 6. Willard 129.

Posted by Brad Frank on Feb 2 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.