Centala is the third wrestler in 15 years to win four straight Northern Michigan championships

Senior wrestler Dylan Centala, who was one of three Northern Michigan Champions to medal in Gaylord last Saturday for the Hurons, became only the third athlete to win four consecutive titles in the 15 years of the event. Starting the tournament as the number one seed at 135 pounds, Centala won all four of his matches with pins (24 seconds, 56 seconds, 2:23, and 1:42). He pinned Brandon Roose of Roscommon in the finals in the first period. Roose had pinned all of his opponents on the way to the bout with Centala. Centala was named most valuable wrestler of the lower weights and earned an additional honor by having the most pins in the least amount of time. The total time of the four matches was 5:38.

Sophomore Chase McLennan (171) and junior Brent Freel (119) were both undefeated and earned first place medals as well. As a team, the Hurons took third with 160 points, 1.5 points behind second place Whittemore-Prescott. Roscommon took first with 187 points.

?I GUESS THERE are 24 other schools that would have been happy with that,? said Lamb of finishing third place. ?Fact of the matter is that we lost nine matches to people that we have previously beaten.?

Lamb blamed himself for the sub par effort. ?I don?t think I prepared my guys last week to go in and win the tournament. In sitting home after the meet, I tallied the point projections on what we could have gotten if we would have won those nine matches, and what they would have meant for our team.? He said the score would have been around 195 to 205 points. The coach added that practice might have been a little too easy last week.

Number-one-seeded Brent Freel (33-3) rolled through his first matches with a 34-second pin, 17-4 major decision, and a 7-0 decision, before edging Greg Janisse of Roscommon 4-3 in the finals. McLennan (33-5) had a tougher road to haul from his position as a second seed. He knocked off senior Eric Counsil of Gaylord 2-0, defeated Carl Worthy of Ogemaw Heights 6-1, and then won an 8-7 decision over number-one-seeded Joel Wilson of Mio. Wilson brought a 34-1 record into the match with McLennan before having to settle for second. ?He really put it together in that match to win the championship,? said Lamb. The coach said all three of his champions wrestled extremely well.

SENIOR BRIAN KRUEGER (30-9) and sophomore T.J. Sobeck (32-9) placed fourth, while senior Mark Grulke (30-11) and sophomore Tharin Wilk (32-8) were fifth. The Hurons will be at Onaway tonight taking on the host Cardinals and Sault Ste. Marie. The next dual will be at Whittemore-Prescott next Thursday. That will be the final scheduled warm up before the Straits Area Conference tournament Saturday, February 11 at Cheboygan. Coach Lamb announced a schedule change early this week. Team districts have been rescheduled from Wednesday, February 15 to Thursday, February 16 in the RCHS gymnasium. Wrestling begins at 6 p.m.

Last Thursday, the Hurons traveled to Newberry and improved their dual record to 18-1 with a pair of victories over Cheboygan, 53-16, and Newberry, 66-18. Double winners included Sobeck, Krueger, Freel, Wilk, Centala (140), Cody Wenzel (145), Jerome Gapczynski (160), Chase McLennan, and Grulke. Taking one match each were Zak McLennan (135), Tyler Schuiteman (152), and Derek Schleben (215).