Indian Lake’s Owen Pummel may be a freshman, but he didn’t look like one during the Division III district wrestling tournament Friday and Saturday in Troy.
Pummel breezed to the finals at 190 pounds and then pulled out a 5-4 win over Greenon’s Ashton Simison to win the weight class.
With his district championship, Pummel earns a berth in this week’s Division III state tournament at Ohio State University.
The top four finishers in each weight class advanced to state. Pummel was the lone Logan County wrestler to earn a state berth.
Pummel, who is now 39-5 on the season, opened Friday with a pin (1:20) over Madeira’s Jesse Hoeffel. He then pinned Nathan Osborn of Wayne Trace in 3:51 to advance to the semifinals.
In the semifinal round, Pummel scored a 10-2 major decision over Mechanicsburg’s Zane Hitchcock.
Pummel then followed with his one-point win over Simison to finish atop the podium in his first trip to the district tournament.
Pummel helped the Lakers to a 13th-place finish. Benjamin Logan placed 27th (18), West Liberty-Salem was 34th (9) and Triad was 37th (5).
Also for the Lakers, freshman Czar Dickson placed sixth at 120 pounds. He was defeated by Madeira’s Aidan Thiele 4-1 in the fifth-place match.
The Lakers’ Thomas Schmiedbusch (138), Jackson Young (144) and Dylan Valerio worked their way to the second consolation round, but were unable to get any further.
Ben Logan was led by 215-pounder Matthew Creamer, who finished fifth. Creamer beat Adam Waller of Mechanicsburg 11-8 in the fourth-place match.
Getting to the second consolation round for the Raiders were Evan Carpenter (120), Kendal Plikerd (150) and Matthew Beikman (165).
Jacob Griffith (132) paced the Tigers. He stayed alive through the third consolation round, but a loss to Versailles’ Payton Platfoot ended his tournament.
Losing in the second consolation round for the Tigers were Gabe McGill (157) and Wylie Harbour (215).
For Triad, Tucker Webb (190) and Awsom Mitchell (165) were able to get to the second consolation round, but were knocked out there.
Steiner, Young lead Chiefs at Wilmington
Bellefontaine sent three wrestlers to the Division II district tournament at Wilmington.
Josh Steiner (220) and Makayla Young (106) were defeated in their first-round matches, but came back to win a consolation match. They then fell in the second consolation round.
Young became the first Chieftain female wrestlers to win a match the the boys district tournament and she is just the second BHS girls to qualify for the district tourney.
The Chiefs’ Jeffery Smith (113) went 0-2.