Women wrestlers roll in season debut

Wayland Baptist's women's wrestlers dominated while the Pioneer men struggled in Saturday morning's dual against Texas Wesleyan at the Pete & Nelda Laney Student Activities Center. The WBU women prevailed, 38-10, while the men fell to the second-year Rams, 48-9.

"It wasn't a bad first showing, but you could definitely tell this was our first competition," WBU coach Aaron Meister said of his women's team's performance. "You train a certain way and prepare to compete, but ultimately once you get out there you never know what's going to happen. Now we have some real, live, competitive experience and some film.

"We can definitely get better."

Wayland, which benefited from four byes, saw Asia Ray and Desiree Zavala pin their opponents at 116 and 143 pounds, respectively.

Also winning on the mat for the WBU women, both by technical fall, were Nina Pham at 109 and Jordan Suarez at 136.

"The girls that I thought could win, won, and some girls who could have won, didn't," Meister said. "We got the job done. We did what we needed to do to win, but there are things we can keep working on and improve on. Everything I saw we can definitely work on.

"Mostly we're just grateful to be able to compete and to compete at home, so we're happy with that."

On the men's side, WBU coach Glenn Gray said the Pioneers – who opened their season at a tournament in Nebraska last weekend – got "disappointing results" in their 48-9 setback to the Rams. The high-scoring dual featured pins on nine of the 10 matches.

"We started out on fire, then the wheels kind of came off a little bit," Gray said.

Johnathon Ortegon got things headed in the right direction for Wayland with a pin at 125 pounds. Pioneer Jesse Diaz followed with a 3-2 decision victory at 133.

"Jesse won a tough match against a California JUCO champion," Gray said.

After that, it was all downhill for WBU as the Rams record eight straight pins. The first came at 141 where Pioneer freshman Christian Espinoza was defeated by a more experienced junior opponent.

"That's where it started to go a little bit sideways," Gray said.

The coach said the Pioneers made too many errors.

"We're very, very young and have some injuries, but mostly a lot of mental errors cost us."

But Gray feels his team, with a little more experience, will be OK.

"This was a minor setback. All-in-all we're moving in the right direction. We have to get back to the drawing board. The attitude and effort is there, but we have to get better with mat IQ and (embracing) the college game."

Next for both the WBU men and women is the USA Wrestling U23 & UWW Junior Nationals on Nov. 12-15 in Omaha, Neb.

"It's going to be a big one and a tough one and a fun one," Meister said.
 
Women
Wayland Baptist 38, Texas Wesleyan 10
191: Kaylynn Albrecht (WBU) received a bye; WBU 5, TXWES 0
101: Caryssa Aguirre (WBU) over Unknown (For.); WBU 10, TXWES 0
109: Nina Pham (WBU) over Carmen Allred (TXWES) (TF 12-2 4:09); WBU 14, TXWES 0
116: Asia Ray (WBU) over Alexandra Magana (TXWES) (Fall 4:21); WBU 19, TXWES 0
123: Camille Fournier (TXWES) over Rebekah Cordova (WBU) (Fall 3:17); WBU 19, TXWES 5
130: Mea Mohler (TXWES) over Jasmine Davis (WBU) (Fall 5:37); WBU 19, TXWES 10
136: Jordan Suarez (WBU) over Maryellen Lafferty (TXWES) (TF 10-0 2:06); WBU 23, TXWES 10
143: Desiree Zavala (WBU) over Lexi Basham (TXWES) (Fall 0:00); WBU 28, TXWES 10
155: Elena Vasquez (WBU) received a bye; WBU 33, TXWES 10  
170: Olivia Ricci (WBU) received a bye; WBU 38, TXWES 10
Exhibitions
109: Nina Pham (WBU) over Madison Brown (TXWES) (TF 11-0 1:58)
109: Ovieonce Ray (WBU) over Carmen Allred (TXWES) (Fall 2:16)
109: Nina Pham (WBU) over Madison Brown (TXWES) (TF 11-0 1:58)
109: Madison Brown (TXWES) over Caryssa Aguirre (WBU) (Fall 3:20)
116: Mia Arceneaux (WBU) over Unknown (Dec 4-3)
116: Asia Ray (WBU) over Carmen Allred (TXWES) (Fall 2:16)
130: Camille Fournier (TXWES) over Jasmine Davis (WBU) (Fall 1:38)
130: Mea Mohler (TXWES) over Rebekah Cordova (WBU) (Dec 15-10)
130: Jasmine Davis (WBU) over Cassidy Nelms (TXWES) (Fall 2:00)
155: Lexi Basham (TXWES) over Elena Vasquez (WBU) (Fall 0:44)

Men
Texas Wesleyan 48, Wayland Baptist 9
125: Johnathon Ortegon (WBU) over Isaac Stalcup (TXWES) (Fall); WBU 6, TXWES 0
133: Jesse Diaz (WBU) over Khalil Tucker (TXWES) (Dec 3-2); WBU 9, TXWES 0
141: Christian Espinoza (TXWES) over Moses Torres (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 6
149: Jason Chambers (TXWES) over Alex Bonner (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 12
157: Michael Kumlein (TXWES) over Brandon Chapin (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 18
165: Don Doyle (TXWES) over Shayden Muzio (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 24
174: Brahn Howard (TXWES) over Jordan Lara (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 30
184: Zane Miller (TXWES) over Hunter McCarty (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 36          
197: Deandre Rucker (TXWES) over Diego Escarcega (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 42
285: Ryan Johnson (TXWES) over William Bennett (WBU) (Fall); WBU 9, TXWES 48