Four Titan wrestlers compete at State, three finish in 8th

Caleb Whipps, Brody Rud, Riley O’Malley and Jose Reyes didn’t receive the medals they wanted at the State Wrestling Tournament, but their coaches said they fought hard with gutsy mental toughness.

Whipps earned an early victory but fell in two matches in the first day, while Rud, O’Malley and Reyes ended just shy of a medal with top-eight finishes.

Coach Shaun Timmerman said the boys performed very well.

“We won some VERY awesome matches, and come-from-behind-wins, which showed that we had a lot of guts,” he said.

The Titans’ performances on the mat even made other coaches take notice.

“Us as coaches even had other head coaches come up to us and tell us how impressed they were with some of these performances. They called our wrestlers ‘gutsy’ and mentioned that they’re mentally tough,” Timmerman said. “It was a great experience for all of our participants, especially since all of them earned more than one match at the state tournament.”

Here are the results: 138AA Caleb Whipps (31-8)

Champ. Round 1 - Caleb Whipps (Tri-City United) 31-8 won by major decision over Joe Kozlowski (Lake City) 28-11 (MD 13-3)

Quarterfinal - Connor Simmonds (Fairmont-Martin County West) 48-4 won by major decision over Caleb Whipps (Tri-City United) 31-8 (MD 14-0)

Consolation Round 1 - Brady Kasprick (Thief River Falls) 37-8 won by fall over Caleb Whipps (Tri-City United) 31-8 (Fall 2:00) 170AA Brody Rud (23-12)

Champ. Round 1 - Brody Rud (Tri-City United) 23-12 won by major decision over Brian Ramos (Perham) 32-6 (MD 11-2)

Quarterfinal - Gavin Nelson (Simley) 44-6 won by tech fall over Brody Rud (Tri-City United) 23-12 (TF-1.5 5:07 (17-1))

Consolation Round 1...

To see more results on this story pick up the March 5, 2020 print edition of the Montgomery Messenger.