Their hearts might have been in their throats, but the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga’s wrestlers swallowed hard and came through with five champions Saturday to win the Southern Conference wrestling tournament at McKenzie Arena.
Some observers felt the 18th-ranked Mocs might have the title locked up before the championship finals, but they found themselves a meager four points ahead of stubborn Appalachian State.
With NCAA berths on the line, though, UTC finally got some breathing room on wins from 125-pound Javier Maldonado, who finished his career without a SoCon loss, and 141-pound Cody Cleveland. UTC clinched the team crown when Seth Garvin rolled to a decision at 157 pounds.
“I wasn’t really thinking about the team title, although I knew it was a tight race,” UTC coach Chris Bono said after the Mocs pulled out their fourth straight tournament title and their 23rd overall. “I was worried about qualifiers. The team championship is icing on the cake.”
UTC finished with 104.5 points to 86.5 for Appalachian, which won just one of its six finals matches. UNC Greensboro was third with 71.5, followed by The Citadel (30.5), VMI 26 and Davidson 24.5
Other UTC champions were Lloyd Rogers at 174 pounds and Josh Edmondson at 184.
Cleveland, only a sophomore, was named the tournament’s outstanding wrestler after pinning both of his opponents in a total time of 4:30.
“I guess I owe it to hard work, my coaches here at UTC, my coaches at McCallie and at Tullahoma,” he said. “I also owe a lot to my family. They have supported me in this sport since I was in the first grade.”
UTC wound up getting eight NCAA tournament qualifiers. Runners-up Stephen Hromada (133), Joey Knox (149) and Matt Koz (197) were awarded three of the league’s five wild-card spots.
Other championships went to UNCG’s Jeff Hedges (133), Appalachian’s Scott Ervin (149), UNCG’s Byron Sigmon (165) and Daren Burns (197) and VMI heavyweight Josh Wine. The remaining wild-card spots went to Appalachian’s Terreyl Williams, the runner-up at 133 pounds, and Austin Trotman, at 184 pounds. Trotman was selected the tournament’s outstanding freshman.
Appalachian State finally went quietly after leading and then dogging the Mocs most of the day and attaining six finalists.
“Our guys have wrestled well. I don’t think anybody expected this kind of race going into the finals,” ASU coach Paul Mance said. “As well as we wrestled, though, I really though we could have had eight finalists. We just didn’t make it at 125 and 165.”
He gave most of the credit to his wrestlers but also pointed out the work of assistant coach JohnMark Bentley.
“They came up with some pins and extra points for their buddies,” he said. “And JohnMark deserves a lot of credit. I don’t get in the wrestling room that much. I do what I can where I can with the administrative part and talking to referees, but JohnMark has these kids believing in him and his system.”
It took him some time to bring people around, but Bently continued to work at it.
“I didn’t ask the kids to do anything I wouldn’t do, and they started coming around when I was there every morning and every afternoon for workouts,” Bentley said.
Ward Gossett is an assistant sports editor and writer for the Times Free Press. Ward has a long history in Chattanooga journalism. He actually wrote a bylined story for the Chattanooga News-Free Press as a third-grader. He Began working part-time there in 1968 and was hired full time in 1970. Ward now covers high school athletics, primarily football, wrestling and baseball and University of Tennessee at Chattanooga wrestling. Over a 40-year career, he has covered ...
