Hosting a dual at home on Tuesday, Jan. 13, the Powell High School boys’ wrestling team rolled past visiting Worland 51-27 before a young lineup made the trip to Missoula, Montana, learning in a difficult tournament at the Jug Beck Rocky Mountain Classic on Friday and Saturday.

WORLAND DUAL

In the home dual the Panthers got off to a strong but difficult start, as Hunter Moulton was awarded the win at 106 pounds despite being injured to give Powell the 6-0 lead. It was determined the Warrior wrestler used an illegal move.

That lead held the entire evening, as Jonathan Hine was awarded the forfeit at 113 pounds and Dylan DeBoer got a pin in 48 seconds at 120 pounds to make it 18-0.

“Jonathan can’t get a home match. I feel bad for the kid, one of our top guys not getting to wrestle at home. He’ll be ready for when it counts,” coach Nick Fulton said. “Dylan had a great match … He got out there, got after a shot right away, finished and then was just pretty relentless on top.”

In one of the closest matches of the night, Russell Goolsbey pulled off the 5-2 decision at 126 pounds, defeating a returning Warriors medalist after strong second and third periods.

“Russell stepped out there and took care of business,” Fulton said. “That was a really mature match for a freshman.”

Sean Lowe added a pin 48 seconds into the first period at 132 pounds, Weston Loeper got a pin 56 seconds into the second period at 138 pounds and Tyler Wenzel pinned his opponent 1:17 into the first period at 144 pounds to give Powell a 39-0 lead.

Worland got its first points at 150 pounds, winning four straight matches by pin to trim down the Panther lead to 39-24.

Justin Marquez secured the match for the Panthers with a pin with 44 seconds left in the second period at 190 pounds, and Tristan Snell pinned his opponent at 215 pounds with 34 seconds left in the third to make it 51-24.

“Justin, he’s battled some injuries and different things this year, it was nice to see him get out there and get a win,” Fulton said. “Tristan put together a solid match. Scored in each period, scored on hit feet. Then third period kind of put the kid in deep water a little bit.”

Worland got the win at 285 with a 4-1 decision over Jacob Christofalos to make the final score 51-27.

“I was pleased with the effort, with the performance,” Fulton said. “I thought they looked more confident, more aggressive.”

MONTANA TOURNEY

After the dual the Panthers made the trip to Missoula on Friday and Saturday for the Jug Beck Rocky Mountain Classic.

“It was stout competition obviously,” Fulton said. “For the most part we’re showing improvements against next level competition. We had a rough first round there, I don’t know whether we weren’t ready to go or what, but that first round we took some losses that I’d like to have seen us get. But we’re going to learn from that and make sure that we correct that next week.”

Powell had one wrestler make the quarterfinals, as Hine received a bye before a pin to make the quarterfinals, but lost two straight to finish the weekend 1-2.

DeBoer and Goolsbey went 2-2 at their respective weights, as Lowe went 1-2; Wenzel went 1-2; Snell went 1-2 and  Christofalos went 1-2 at 285 pounds.

Loeper went 0-2, Jayce Lejeune went 0-2 at 150 pounds, Isaiah Torres went 0-2 at 165 pounds and Marquez went 0-2.

Powell finished 23rd as a team as the only Wyoming team in attendance with 38.5 points as Mead, Washington, took the top spot with 267.5 points.

“I didn’t really hesitate to put them in that caliber of a tournament. They need to see that, it’s part of the growing process … We’re young across the board. That’s the hand we’re dealt. We’re gonna have to work as hard as we can to make these guys competitive.”

RETURN TO WYOMING

That Missoula tournament was the Panther’s final out-of-state competition this season.

Powell was supposed to host Lovell this Thursday for a dual, but a scheduling issue forced that to be moved to Feb. 3.

That means the Panthers head to Lander on Friday and Saturday for a tournament as their only action for the week, with Fulton noting the Panthers will still be picking and choosing where to place athletes throughout the coming weeks before preparing for regionals and state.

“We’re going to pick and choose here these next couple of weeks, a lot of our young guys are probably going to go JV in Lander and Riverton, just so they get some matches against kids their age,” Fulton said. “I still plan to take most of them to Greybull here in a couple weeks, get them a little more varsity time before regionals. But, we’re gonna pick and choose where we put these kids in the lineup and where we wrestle in JV, but for sure in our duals, we’re gonna put out what we’ve got. Just part of the growing process.”