42KG
1st – Gavin Teasdale, PA (8)
2nd – Peter Ogunsanya, IL (8)
3rd – Zack Murillo, CT (11)
4th – Holden Heller, IL (8)
5th – Rhett Golowenski, OK (8)
6th – Patrick McKee, MN (8)
As expected, with the exception of Murillo, this was a weight class dominated by pre-HS competitors. Most regard Teasdale as one of country’s elite MS wrestlers, and he backed it up by teching through his pool before posting a 10-1 finals win over Ogunsanya. Speaking of Ogunsanya, he had quite the impressive run himself. Relatively unheralded prior to this weekend, the 8th grader won a 7-6 bout to eliminate Jason Holmes of AZ who had beaten him the Greco finals less than 48 hours beforehand. Then with a finals berth on the line he followed up by winning an 11-10 barn burner over Murillo, a Cadet FS runner-up in Fargo last summer.
46KG
1st – Cade Olivas, CA (8)
2nd – Roman Bravo-Young, AZ (8)
3rd – Louie Hayes, IL (10)
4th – Brandon Courtney, AZ (9)
5th – Drew Mattin, OH (9)
6th – Zach Sherman, NJ (9)
A member of last year’s Cadet Greco World Team over 15 months prior to beginning HS, Olivas is a truly a prodigy. Surprisingly, he actually took a loss in the Greco finals on Friday, but bounced back in impressive fashion for FS competition. Often named as the country’s top pound-for-poudn MS wrestler, Olivas recorded shutout TF’s against all of his opponents except RU Bravo-Young, who he defeated by a 10-4 score. The opposite pool was far more closely contested, and Hayes had to win a pair of criteria matches against Courtney and Sherman in order to earn a berth in the finals. However, he was on the wrong end of a shutout TF in his true 2nd match against the extremely impressive up-and-comer, Bravo-Young.
50KG
1st – Spencer Lee, PA (9)
2nd – Ben Freeman, MI (9)
3rd – Joey Prata, VA (10)
4th – Kaden Gfeller, OK (9)
5th – Bryce West, IA (9)
6th – Drew West, IA (9)
Lee was a member of the 2013 Cadet World Team at this weight, and he could not have been more dominant in retaining his spot. Still just a freshman, Lee TF’d all his opponents with little difficulty, giving up just 1 point throughout the tournament. The best of the rest was Freeman, who lost to Lee in his pool, but came back to defeat Prata for true 2nd. Perhaps the biggest surprise was Austin Gomez of IL, last year’s Cadet World Team member at 42kg, who went 1-2 and failed to place. Also falling short of the podium was AZ’s Danny Vega, a Cadet FS champ in Fargo last summer.
54KG
1st – Daton Fix, OK (9)
2nd – Nick Suriano, NJ (10)
3rd – Brock Rathbun, IA (10)
4th – Vitali Arujau, NY (9)
5th – Dalton Duffield, OK (10)
6th – Ian Parker, MI (10)
Suriano has long been regarded among the country’s finest, but had minimal FS credentials prior to this weekend. However, he quickly erased any doubts about his ability to cross styles, teching through his pool to set up a finals mega-match with Fix. The match itself was relatively uneventful, but Fix, who was a runner-up at this event last year, used his experience to squeeze out a 1-1 criteria win. Among the most surprising DNP’s were OH’s Jose Rodriguez and TX’s Jack Mueller, both of whom were AA’s at this event a year ago.
58KG
1st – Carther Happel, IA (10)
2nd – Nick Lee, IN (9)
3rd – Gabriel Townsell, IL (10)
4th – Richard Montoya, NM (11)
5th – Kyle Bierdumpfel, NJ (10)
6th – Corey Shie, OH (9)
A FILA Cadet FS runner-up last year, Lee entered this tournament as the favorite to make the 2014 Cadet World Team. However, Happel had different intentions and imposed them in finals. Happel made an early statement with a 4-point throw to open the final bout. Lee would narrow the gap to 4-3 at the break, but Happel took control with another 4-point move to start the 2nd, eventually winning by a final score of 12-7. Interestingly, Happel actually took a loss to Shie early, but Shie would later lose to Townsell who Happell had defeated. This created a 3-way tie between them, and the bonus point Happel scored in his TF over Townsell proved to be the difference.
63KG
1st – Jared Verkleeren, PA (9)
2nd – Austin Kraisser, MD (10)
3rd – Wyatt Sheets, OK (10)
4th – Dominick Demas, OH (9)
5th – Johnny O’Hearon, UT (11)
6th – Robert Lee, WI (11)
With the lone exception of Hunter Ritter at 87KG, Verkleeren was the most surprising of the 11 champs. He fell short of placing at his respective state tournament during the HS season, so to make a World Team less than 3 months later is pretty remarkable. His toughest match came in the opening round, where he defeated OH state champ Nate Hagan by a 4-3 score. Verkleeren went on to pin/tech his next 6 opponents before beating Demas 4-2 to advance to the finals. There he was a significant underdog against Kraisser, but managed to dominate the final period for a 5-1 win. This was a parity-filled weight that included some pretty surprising DNP’s, most notably respective state champs Cameron Coy of PA and Devin Bahr of WI.
69KG
1st – Mason Manville, NJ (10)
2nd – Trace Carello, IL (10)
3rd – Cameron Harrell, MD (11)
4th – Jakob Restrepo, NY (11)
5th – Joey Gunther, IL (11)
6th – Kaleb Young, PA (10)
In one of the weekend’s most dominant performances, Manville once again proved why he is among the country’s finest HS wrestlers regardless of weight or grade. Between FS & GR he wrestled a total of 15 matches over 3 days, and only surrendered 1 point throughout. Unfortunately, the anticipated showdown between he and Zahid Valencia didn’t happen due to an injury suffered by Valencia during Greco competition.
76KG
1st – Mark Hall, MN (10)
2nd – Beau Breske, WI (10)
3rd – Nick Reenan, PA (10)
4th – Taylor Lujan, GA (11)
5th – Jacob Warner, IL (9)
6th – Andrew McNally, OH (10)
Hall has won just about everything else there is for a Cadet aged wrestler to win, but had yet to make a world team prior to this weekend. Doing so required him going through some seriously elite competition, but Hall did so with minimal struggle. He pinned/teched through his pool, which included 2013 Cadet triple crown winner Reenan. In the finals he completely controlled Breske, a double Cadet champ in Fargo last summer, to the tune of a 4-1 final score. Based on his performance at FILA Cadets, it’s hard to imagine Hall not being a serious contender to win a World Championship in Slovakia this summer.
85KG
1st – Hunter Ritter, MD (11)
2nd – Sammy Colbray, OR (10)
3rd – Lance Benick, MN (11)
4th – Nathan Traxler, IL (10)
5th – Tyler Johnson, IL (11)
6th – Jack Harris, OH (10)
It was Ritter who earned the Cadet World Team spot at 85KG, but by all accounts the most notable match of the tournament came prior to the finals when Colbray upset Benick. A member of last year’s Cadet World Team up at 100KG, Benick was arguably the most prohibitive favorite at any weight class. However, the rest of the field was also rich with talent, and he fell victim to it. With a finals berth on the line, Benick and Colbray were tied at 1 with under 30 seconds remaining when Colbray shocked the wrestling world and launched Benick for 4. He went on to win that match by a 7-1 final, but came up short in a back-and-forth finals battle with Ritter that ended in a score of 10-7.
100KG
1st – Jordan Wood, PA (10)
2nd – Andrew Marsden, IL (11)
3rd – Lucas Warren, IL (10)
4th – Landon Pelham, MI (10)
5th – Gannon Gremmel, IA (10)
6th – Isaac Florell, MN (11)
Marsden was a late addition to this weight class, and his presence added a lot of excitement to what was already a stacked field. The eventual runner-up pinned in all of his wins, but struggled in a 7-1 loss to the eventual champion, Wood. In the finals Wood controlled Warren in a 9-4 decision, and Marsden then wrapped the action by recording another fall in his true 2nd match with Warren.
125KG
1st – Jake Marnin, IA (11)
2nd – Kevin Vough, OH (9)
3rd – Thomas Helton, IL (10)
4th – Dante Jiovenetta, FL (10)
5th – Garyn Huntley, NY (9)
Coming in this figured to be 3-horse race. However, that number was trimmed to 2 when WA’s Tate Orndorff was forced to withdraw. That allowed Marnin and Vough to cruise to the finals, where the 2X Cadet FS champ Marnin controlled a 9-4 bout to make his first world team.
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