Day 1 complete
Following a championship semifinal round that saw three Spartans advance to Saturday's finals, Emporia maintained its 23.5-point lead in the Class 5A team standings.
The Spartans now have 113.5 team points, ahead of second-place Lansing's 90. Seniors Sal Tovar and Tavo Dikin and junior Lorenzo Serna advanced to the finals in their respective weight classes. Junior Mark Kolmer, in a surprise, was one of four Spartans who lost in the semifinals, along with senior Zeb Peak, junior Logan Gaskill and sophomore Chase Sanchez.
Tovar pinned Lansing's Dillon Scanlon just 46 seconds into their 135-pound match to record career win No. 131, tying him with Dusty Spaulding for first on Emporia High's all-time win list. Tovar will face Winfield's Vance Oliver tomorrow for both the individual State championship and the establishment of Emporia's new win record.
Dikin came out on top in a rough semifinal match at 140 pounds, defeating Turner's Jason Langford by an 8-1 count. He'll face Valley Center's Cade Blair in Saturday's final. At heavyweight, Serna rode out McPherson's Zach Peterson late for a 3-1 victory to close Emporia's day, giving him a finals matchup with Carroll's Tony Marquez.
Kolmer, the No. 1-ranked wrestler in the state at 189 pounds, had a 2-0 lead on Liberal's Nate Davis with about seven seconds remaining when Davis executed a reversal to send the match into overtime. Neither wrestler scored in the sudden-death OT, but in the second OT, Davis — ranked No. 5 at 189 — pinned Kolmer with four seconds remaining.
Peak lost his semifinal to Tyler Sutherland of Liberal, who notched a fall at the 3:54 mark. Gaskill lost to Kyle Detmer of Bishop Carroll, the No. 1 wrestler in the state at 160 pounds, by a 12-4 major decision. Sanchez lost a close 6-5 decision to Colby Crank, the top-ranked grappler at 145 pounds.
Saturday's action begins with cross-bracketing at 9 a.m. The championship finals are scheduled to begin at 4:30 p.m. For complete coverage of Friday's action, please see Saturday's Gazette.
Consolation first round complete
The Spartans went 2-1 in the consolation first round, as Colby Walecki and Taylor Lee won their consolation openers.
At 125 pounds, Walecki beat Liberal's Adam Meacham by a 9-5 score. At 171, Lee defeated Anthony Ellingsworth of Bonner Springs by a 15-6 count. At 215, Jordan Barr lost to Schlagle's Brandon Nickerson 3-2, ending Barr's tournament.
Emporia now has 78.5 team points and is still in the lead in Class 5A. Lansing is in second with 55 points, and Carroll is in third with 54.
Quarterfinals- EHS wrestling complete
Zeb Peak, Logan Gaskill, Mark Kolmer and Lorenzo Serna finished off Emporia's quarterfinal round by winning and advancing to the semifinals, making a total of seven Spartans to reach the semis.
Peak and Gaskill both earned wins over the No. 3-ranked wrestlers in their class. Peak pinned Pittsburg's Jordan Brown with eight seconds remaining in the first period, and Gaskill came back from a 5-0 deficit to defeat Lansing's Tyler Baughman 6-5. Gaskill scored a takedown to tie the match with just over a minute to go in the second period, then earned a stalling point in the final minute of the match for the victory.
Kolmer trailed 2-0 to Hutchinson's Dakota Sherry at the end of the first period, but an escape and a takedown in the second gave him a 3-2 lead, and he held on in the third to go to 37-1 and reach the semifinals. Serna defeated Liberal's Ricky Gomez at heavyweight by a score of 7-2.
Quarterfinals through 145 pounds
Emporia followed three losses with three wins in its first six quarterfinal bouts.
Following Bryce Dakin's defeat, Jared Dakin came back from a 10-4 deficit but couldn't complete the comeback, losing 10-8 to Salina South's Blaine Smith at 119 pounds. At 130, Justin Rose fell behind 8-0 to Andover Central's Josh Umscheid, then came extremely close to scoring a pin of Umscheid for what would have been a comeback victory. But Umscheid got out of Rose's clutches and held on for an 8-4 win.
Sal Tovar notched Emporia's first victory of the quarters at 135 pounds, earning career win No. 130 by beating Hutchinson's JR Roman 9-1. Tavo Dikin defeated Liberal's Allen Catalan by a 6-1 decision to punch his ticket to the semifinals, and Chase Sanchez pinned Byron Roath of Kansas City-Washington at the 1:46 mark to put a third Spartan in the semis.
Quarterfinals, 103 pounds; score through round 1
Emporia leads the Class 5A team standings through round one with 35.5 team points. Lansing was in second with 24 points, followed by Valley Center with 23, Hutchinson with 21.5 and Carroll with 21.
Bryce Dakin was taken down in the first quarterfinal match for the Spartans at 103 pounds, losing to Lansing's Bo Pursel by a 7-4 final.
First round - EHS wrestling complete
Jordan Barr was pinned in his first-round match at 215 pounds, and Lorenzo Serna earned a fall in his heavyweight bout, completing Emporia's first round with 10 of 13 Spartans having moved on to the quarterfinals.
Howard Johnson of Great Bend pinned Barr 36 seconds into their match. At 285, Serna took 1:47 to secure a pin on Newton's David Garcia.
The final score of Taylor Lee's match at 171 was officially 15-12.
First round - 152, 160, 171 and 189 pounds
Zeb Peak and Logan Gaskill advanced to the quarterfinals at 152 and 160 pounds, respectively, while Taylor Lee was bounced to the consolation round in an apparently controversial match at 171 pounds. Mark Kolmer advanced at 189.
Peak scored a takedown with about seven seconds remaining in his match with Anthony Mies of Bishop Carroll for a 10-2 major decision. Gaskill won easily, 10-0, over Salina South's Taylor Anderson.
Lee came back from a 13-4 deficit and pulled within a few points of Jonathan Truman of Kapaun with just seconds remaining. But with three seconds left, the officials called the match, saying time should have already expired. The scoreboard read 14-12 at the time of the match being called, but that apparently may not have been the actual final score, because there was confusion on the scorekeeping. More on this bout later.
Kolmer, who finished second at State last year, pinned first-round opponent Brandon Pate of Winfield at the 1:36 mark. So nine of Emporia's first 11 wrestlers have advanced to the quarters.
First round - 135, 140 and 145 pounds
Sal Tovar, Tavo Dikin and Chase Sanchez made it six Emporia wrestlers to advance to the quarterfinals in the Spartans' first seven matches.
Tovar earned the 129th victory of his career, taking just 29 seconds to pin Miege's Joe McSorley in his 135-pound first round match, doing so after rocking McSorley forward on a cradle. Tovar is now two wins away from Dusty Spaulding's school record of 131. Dikin needed only 57 seconds to score a fall on Ryan Demato of Bonner Springs. Sanchez jumped out to a 9-3 lead on Tyler Harradine of Salina South before Harradine injured his shoulder. Harradine attempted to return, but went down again, giving the match to Sanchez by injury default.
First round - 103, 119, 125 and 130 pounds
VALLEY CENTER - Emporia High got victories from Bryce Dakin, Jared Dakin and Justin Rose in its first four matches in the opening round of the Class 5A State wrestling tournament at Valley Center. Colby Walecki was sent into the consolation bracket with an overtime loss.
Bryce Dakin defeated fellow freshman Beau Johnson of McPherson at 103 pounds by a 7-4 count. Older brother Jared, a senior, dominated his first-round opponent at 119 pounds, Great Bend's Brodie Betz, beating the freshman by a 17-0 technical fall.
Walecki was around 15 seconds away from advancing to the 125-pound quarterfinals when his first-round opponent, Miege's Sasha Ambrose, earned an escape to tie the match at 1-1. In the first overtime, Ambrose scored a takedown of Walecki to earn the 3-1 sudden-death win.
Rose, wrestling in the fourth State tourney of his career, racked up five points on Miege's John Hanson before pinning him with 4 seconds remaining in the first round.