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Wildin takes sixth at state tournament

Sports reporter

With a school-tying record five wrestlers, Marion High School notched 14 team points this past weekend at the 3-2-1A state meet.

Sophomore Dillon Wildin earned a sixth-place medal.

Wildin became the second wrestler since MHS started its own program to earn a medal.

Adam Depler took sixth place at the 2005 state meet.

"It felt great," Wildin said. "I wanted to make sure everyone knew how I felt."

He and the four other wrestlers, freshman Andy Shipman, sophomores Cody Wildin and Tylor Neil, and senior Charlie Holub, combined to go 7-11 during the weekend.

"I thought we wrestled well," head coach Chad Adkins said.

Dillon Wildin and Holub won their first two matches, meaning a victory in the second round would put them in the championship semifinals.

Instead, Wildin was pinned by eventual champion Dustin Zahorsky of Phillipsburg, and Holub fell 5-1 to Jordan Noll of Effingham.

Wildin then came back with a 14-7 victory against Caney Valley's Nick Hockett, and a 1-0 thriller against Ellis' Kevin Urban.

The victory against Urban guaranteed Wildin at least a sixth-place finish and a medal.

Wildin was then matched-up against 27-5 Tommy Knapp of Lincoln for a chance at the third-place match.

In another close match, Wildin fell 2-0, and was headed into the fifth-place match.

The sophomore recorded seven points, but gave up 10 to St. Francis' 29-10 Gavin Smull.

Wildin ended his season at 30-9.

"I really wanted to look for a medal and place as high as possible," Wildin said. "I knew first or second was possible."

When that didn't happen he set his sights on third, but eventually headed home with the sixth-place hardware.

"It's a completely different match," Wildin said of state competition. "Everyone wrestles three times as hard and gets after it."

His coach was pleased with the effort.

"He wrestled tough all weekend," Adkins said. "I was very happy."

Holub, who was wrestling at state for the third and final time, defeated Colton Clarke of Lyons 10-3 in the first round.

Clarke kept it close in the first two periods, but Holub widened the gap with back points in the third.

At 31-8, Holub then lost to 30-8 Noll to move to the consolation bracket.

It was a win-or-go-home match for Holub against Sage Thimmesch (28-9) of Garden Plain in the next round.

The senior racked up 14 points and defeated Thimmesch by six to stay alive in the tournament.

One more victory would have meant a medal for Holub, but Derek Soucie of Wichita Independent defeated him in a low-scoring dual, 2-0.

Holub finished out the season 32-10. He and fellow senior Hank Collett will be the only wrestlers not back next season because of graduation.

"I was hoping Charlie would get a medal," Adkins said. "He thought he should have medaled."

Cody Wildin and Neil both went 1-2 on the day, losing in the first round, but bouncing back with a victory in their second matches.

In the 125-pound class, Wildin was defeated by a technical fall, 17-2, against 37-3 Brett Lamar of Silver Lake.

His next match was the exact opposite, as he went into overtime with Dusty Greer of Minneapolis.

Wildin and Greer fought back and forth as Wildin led 2-1 early, and later, 4-3.

A reversal by Greer in the final 30 seconds gave him a 5-4 lead, but Wildin escaped with less than 20 seconds left, giving him a point, and forcing the match into overtime.

In the sudden-death competition, Greer shot at Wildin and looked to have the winning takedown.

But Wildin held strong, and with the two wrestlers still even, escaped from Greer's grasp and swung behind him, gaining control and the takedown.

Wildin would lose to Aaron Patton of Wellsville in the next round, ending his day, and season, with a 26-11 record.

Neil, who lost to Decatur Community's Everett Urban in the first round, recorded MHS' only pinfall in his second match.

He was trailing 2-0 in his match against Pleasant Ridges' Elliot Mathews when he turned the tables on his opponent, and nearly pinned him before the whistle.

Neil began right where he left off when the second period began, pinning Mathews to move on to the next round.

However, Neil managed just one point, and fell to Phillipsburg's Weston Coomes by six.

Neil ended his season with a 22-16 record.

"He drew well and competed," Adkins said. "We need him to step it up all season next year."

The freshman Shipman was 0-2 in his matches, but it didn't help he faced number one ranked and eventual 119-pound state champion Collin Hase of Silver Lake in the first round.

Shipman was pinned in just 39 seconds, and it set him up with eventual fourth-place finisher Aaron Geist of Osborne, who also pinned the freshman.

Shipman's two opponents finished the season with a combined record of 67-11.

In his first season at MHS, Shipman finished 23-17, and always will have the memory of qualifying for the state tournament in his first attempt.

"I told him he should be proud of himself for even getting there," Adkins said.

The 2007-08 team will now go down as the most successful MHS program to date.

"It was a good ending to our best season ever," Adkins said.

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