Ponies wrestle at Independence

INDEPENDENCE — Iola Middle School’s wrestling team was on the road Monday competing in the Independence Middle School Invitational.
The Ponies had six wrestlers got undefeated for first place in their respective brackets. They came home with four second-place performances also.
Alex Bauer pinned three opponents to win his division. He beat Woods of Chanute, Gronick of Parsons and Walker of Parsons. Bauer was the one of two  Iola wrestlers having three matches on the night.
Jake Gumfory powered past Collins of Parsons 12-0 then pinned Houser of Fredonia to take first.
“We started out pretty slowly Monday but came on toward the end,” said Ron Schomaker, Iola Middle School head coach. “As a group, we’ve got to work on not making the same mistakes when we wrestle.”
Jonathan Tidd won two matches by falls over Pollock of Fredonia and Jackson of Parsons. Brock Peters took first with pins of Carey of Chanute and Douglas of Cherryvale.
Jordan Long claimed first with a best-of-three situation. He pinned Triplett of Chanute twice. Trey Colborn did the same against Jansen of Fredonia.
Kaleb Mock was second in his bracket with a pin of Hootes of Cherryvale then losing by a fall to Hollandsworth of Caney.
Brice Aiello defeated Richmond of Independence 8-6 then lost 14-4 to Gullich of Caney. That gave Aiello second place.
Andrew Garber lost 11-8 to Coleman of Parsons then took second by pinning Ward of Chanute. Stormy Reed was second in his bracket with a 7-4 win over Adams of Fredonia then a 16-1 loss to Burgess of Fredonia.
Chandler House finished third in his division, going 1-2. He lost 8-0 to Smith of Independence and was pinned by Gastineau of Cherryvale. House came back to beat Montgomery of Independence 9-3.
In best-of-three situations, Iola had six wrestlers lose two matches.
Daniel Ware was pinned twice by Harden of Cherryvale. Wyatt Hines was pinned by Killion of Chanute and lost 12-1.
Gus Hopkins was pinned twice by Couch of Fredonia. Tryston Ingle lost 9-1 and 4-2 to Harvey of Fredonia.
Trevor Cox lost by a technical fall and was pinned by Ornelas of  Chanute. Scott Hall had the same fate against Aylor of Fredonia.
“We’ll have a week to get some things accomplished in practices before we start to wind our season down,” Schomaker said.
The Ponies go to the Coffeyville Invitational Saturday. They will have two more tournaments — Parsons on Nov. 30 and Chanute on Dec. — to finish out the season.