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About The Observer. (La Grande, Or.) 1968-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 10, 2020)
7A Friday, January 10, 2020 The Observer Prep wrestling Top-ranked Tigers bury Baker By Ronald Bond The Observer LA GRANDE — A match- up of top-fi ve teams Wednes- day quickly turned into a rout by the newly christened No. 1 team in Wednesday’s 4A wrestling coaches poll — the La Grande Tigers. In their only dual at La Grande High School this season, the Tigers put on a stunning performance, recording seven pins and winning all but two matches on the way to a 61-7 victory over rival Baker — which itself is ranked fourth in the state. “Those kids really rose up,” La Grande head coach Klel Carson said. “Those early weights, those young kids like we were talking about…they’ve never been in a dual. All freshmen, and wrestling state placers.” Not only wrestling state placers, but beating many of them. After Delia Gulzow won by forfeit to give the Tigers an early lead, freshman Bry- sen Peneloza (113 pounds) needed only 38 seconds to pin Caleb Shaw and give La Grande a 12-0 advantage. Staff photo by Ronald Bond La Grande’s Gabe Shukle pinned Baker’s Jaden Martin Wednesday to cap off a dominant dual by the Tigers, who defeated the Bulldogs 61-7 at La Grande High School. “I really wanted to win and start the team off good,” Peneloza said. “The team did really good. I thought it was going to be closer, but we did really good.” The tone for the night was set with Peneloza’s victory. Josh Collins (120) and Braden Carson (132) both recorded second-round pins over Baker opponents Gavin Stone and Cody Eskew as La Grande claimed the fi rst six victories, surged to a 31-0 margin and took complete control. “We lost a couple matches there that we probably should have won at 120, 126, 138, (and) once you start do- ing that, it’s like a steamroll- er, and it’s hard to get your team morale turned around,” Baker head coach Brandon Young said. “That was kind of what happened.” The performance was one that stunned the LHS head coach, who before the dual said he believed there would be several tough matches. “I gotta give (Baker) some credit. They’re rivals, but they’re really tough. They’re quite literally probably the third best team in the state or maybe the fourth best team in the state,” coach Carson said. “I was a little bit surprised.” Baker stopped La Grande’s run with a close 3-2 decision by Jake Eskew over Braxton Bisenius at 145 and a 16-5 major decision by Ian Feldmeier over Wyatt Livingston at 152. But the rest of the night belong to the Tigers, who won four of the fi nal fi ve matches by fall — none taking longer than Spencer Gerst’s 1:20 takedown of Alex Ritter at 220 pounds which made the score 55-7. The exclamation point came moments after Gerst’s win. Gabe Shukle (285) needed only 53 seconds to pin Jaden Martin to cap See Tigers / Page 8A College track and fi eld Photo by Alex Navarro/EOU Athletics Eastern Oregon University’s Corey Sledge, shown during last year’s Cascade Colle- giate Conference meet, is the defending outdoor national champion in the pole vault. Photo by Alex Navarro/EOU Athletics Eastern Oregon University’s Payton Jolley, shown during last year’s Cascade Colle- giate Conference meet, was an all-American in the pole vault in 2019. Mountaineers have high hopes for track season ■ Men look to build off of last year’s fourth-place CCC finish By Ronald Bond The Observer LA GRANDE — The Eastern Oregon University men’s track and fi eld team is blended. The Mountaineers enter 2020 with a range of ath- letes from younger athletes who make up a talented underclass to more veteran athletes who have experi- ence on the biggest stage of NAIA track and fi eld. It’s a mix, that, if ev- erything comes together, should be in contention for a Cascade Collegiate Confer- ence title and, according to head coach Ben Welch, could fi nish anywhere from 10th to 20th at nationals — both indoor and outdoor. “With the middle distance group we have the vault crew (and) we’re better in the sprints and jumps than we were last year. (It’ll) be interesting to see how it all comes up,” Welch said. On the experience end, the Mountaineers bring back defending outdoor pole vault national champion Corey Sledge, who was among three vaulters to place in the top nine at nationals last spring and part of what he believes could be the best vaulting group in the nation. “As far as our pole vault squad goes, we should be No. 1 if not No. 2 in the nation as a group in NAIA,” he said. Sledge also expects there to be more balance across the team this season. “We brought in some really good talent on the men’s side, especially in the sprints,” he said. “Where we were lacking hard last year was the core sprints. We have our distance covered and most of the fi eld events (covered).” Dustin Zimmerly and Alex Navarro also are former all- Americans, and Zimmerly has high hopes for himself and the team. “We have the strong- headed guys that are willing to put in the work to (excel). Some of them don’t realize how good they are, so I think there’s going to be a lot of guys proving more to them- selves and gaining a lot of confi dence this year. We are still young and we lost quite a few good bodies,” Zimmerly said. “With this guys’ group, we’ve (taken) that as motiva- tion to step up.” Zimmerly said from an individual standpoint, he wants to fi nish atop the podium with teammate Navarro at nationals in the 1,000-meter run. “I’m hoping we can both get on the podium, possibly 1-2,” he said. “He’s really, really fi t, and he’s trained so hard. It’d be really nice.” Also among the return- ers for EOU is last year’s standout athlete at the CCC meet, jumper Allex Kosel, who was the top individual point scorer. Kosel said the team has a good dynamic and there a competitiveness among the See Men / Page 8A ■ Women aim for CCC title after taking second a year ago By Ronald Bond The Observer LA GRANDE — The Eastern Oregon University women’s track and fi eld team has been on a steady trajectory upward the past couple of seasons. Last year the program claimed a total of 13 all-Americans between the indoor and outdoor sea- sons, landed several Cascade Collegiate Conference cham- pions, and as a team took second at the CCC meet. And with a still relatively young group, there is hope that this team could grab a CCC title in the spring and make noise at nationals — both in the indoor national meet in early March and the outdoor national meet in late May. “The women I think may- be have a little more balance across the event spectrum (than the men),” EOU head coach Ben Welch said. “We have somebody (Maggie Ledbetter) who has already qualifi ed for nationals in the shot, which we haven’t had for quite a few years. We have returning all-Amer- icans in relays, and in the vault we’re solid, returning an outdoor all-American in the women’s vault. We have a returning all-American indoors in the long jump. It’s a pretty balanced group on the women’s side.” The Mountaineers indeed have most of their all- Americans back both indoors and outdoors. That includes senior Paige Dodd, an indoor all-American in the pentath- lon and an outdoor all-Amer- ican in the heptathlon who has been close to breaking the program record in the heptathlon. “Final year, so I’m obvi- ously wanting to go out with a bang. I’ve already noticed improvement from last year, so that’s encouraged me to train more because there’s so much more in me,” Dodd said, “especially think- ing about the things I did indoor vs. outdoor. I know I can bring some of that into indoor this season.” Dodd said there is a higher focus and better unity and attitude among the team this season than a year ago. Sprinter Megan Bolton, who is among the returners on the all-American 4x400 indoor relay team, said she also sees where those traits are stronger than in 2019. “I think the women’s team has a lot of unity this year that they didn’t necessar- ily have as much last year, and that (will) help with the success individually by supporting each other,” she said. “I also think the talent and the drive this particular group has now makes them just a step above the group that we had last year, just being more determined to reach goals they set, setting the goals (and) pushing each other to do what their goals are.” Another of last year’s all-Americans was Ebony See Women / Page 8A
