PARSONS — Brice Aiello won his third consecutive gold medal for Iola Middle School’s wrestling team in Tuesday’s Parsons Middle School tournament. The tournament was held at Labette Community College.
Aiello claimed the championship in his 134-pound A bracket with a perfect 3-0. The Iola eighth-grader pinned all three of his opponents in a combined 3 minutes, 59 seconds, according to IMS head coach Aaron Sweazy.
Aiello pinned Zach Christensen of Columbus to open the action on the mat. It took just 25 seconds for Aiello to pin Ethan Bell of Coffeyville in the second match then pinned Dilon Roedel of Frontenac.
The Ponies came home with eight medals out of 13 weight brackets. Their short middle school wrestling season concludes Thursday at the Royster Middle School Invitational in Chanute.
Andrew Garber, another eighth-grader, finished second in the 155A bracket. Garber bounced back from a 17-1 technical fall to Jace McDown of Columbus to win twice. He pinned Cameron Williams of Pittsburg then notched a major decision, 14-0, over Triston Pringle of Chanute.
Michael Trainor came away with two third-place medals after Parsons combined the 155-pound and 165-pound B brackets and two medals were given to wrestlers. Trainer lost both of his matches by falls to Jordan Mason and Max Jones, both of Independence.
“Brice had a fantastic showing and Andrew rebounded nicely after suffering a defeat to a tough opponent,” Sweazy said. I was very disappointed in our effort at Parsons. We ran into Pittsburg and Columbus, which are teams that eat, breathe and sleep wrestling whereas we are a team that is just learning to crawl only in our fifth year at the middle school level.”
Aaron Terhune lost quickly in his first match to Corvell Littleton of Chanute in the 115-pound B bracket. Terhune took the silver in the bracket when he was awarded wins by injury defaults over Paige Smith of Independence and Justen Cronick of Parsons.
R.J. Holding placed second in the 127-pound A bracket with a 1-2 mark. Holding was pinned by Jose Cuevas of Coffeyville then dominated Nelson Guzman of Pittsburg 10-0. He lost 7-3 to Scott Collins of Parsons and won the tie-breaker for second place.
Nathaniel Evans earned the bronze medal in the 110-pound A bracket. Evans pinned Connor Ethridge of Chanute in 11 seconds top begin the tournament. Independence’s Kyler Sanders threw a headlock hold to pin Evans in the second match. Evans was up 5-2 on Ricky Pando of Columbus but Pando scored a reverse and pinned Evans with six seconds left in the match.
In the 75-pound A bracket, Iola’s Ben Cooper finished third. Cooper was pinned by Austin Feast and Tanner Hitchcock, both of Pittsburg.
“Our win total on the night was the lowest output of the year and you almost wonder if the overdose of possible Thanksgiving turkey. Plus we’ve only had one workout since last Tuesday,” Sweazy said.
Judith Branstetter showed great improvement match by match in the 80-pound B bracket, Sweazy said. She was pinned by Layne Tucker of Independence, lost by technical fall, 19-2, to Brent See of Chanute and lost by a major decision to Trysten Mathis of Parsons.
Mason Snavely was in “a brutal weight class (90A),” and did not place. Snavely was pinned by Gage Matlock of Chanute, lost 16-0 to Wes Jameson of Frontenac and got edged out 8-7 by Matt DeVoe of Chanute.
Rhett Allen was 1-2 in the 141-pound B bracket. He lost by a fall to Gabe Campbell of Independence. Allen pinned James Getman of Pittsburg then was pinned by Aaron Burke of Parsons.
Brandon Towne was pinned by Kasey Dixon of Frontenac, Tyler Metcalf of Parsons and Christian Hyde of Pittsburg in the 134-pound B bracket.
Chandler House was pinned by Dylan Carey of Chanute and Kyler Taylor of Pittsburg plus lost 5-2 to Hunter Honeycutt of Frontenac at 141.
Seth Sanford was pinned by Noah Struble of Independence. He defaulted his other matches because of a hand injury.
