The Avery wrestling team met up with a tough squad from Morganton Draughn High School on Wednesday evening at Viking Gym, losing by a total match score of 39-36.Avery picked up 18 of its team points in the match via forfeit, with victories at the 103 pound class by Bennett Sweat, the 171 pound class by CJ Vance, and the 189 pound class by Lucas Lecka. The Vikings gave up forfeit defeats at the 125 pound and 160 pound classes, respectively.
In the remaining matches of the evening, the Vikings worked hard to earn team points. Nick Malgadey earned a pinfall victory at the 0:50 mark of the first period over Draughn’s Spencer Johnson. Brock Yackey earned a pinfall victory with ten seconds remaining in the first round of action over opponent Seth Cook.
Jose Munoz wrestled for Avery at the 152 pound weight class, earning a third period pinfall victory over opponent Robert McCarthy.
Avery fell by pinfall in three matches, and the match was decided by three narrow, hard fought matches, all won by Draughn in narrow decision victories.
In the 130 pound weight class Tyler Long wrestled a tough match with Draughn’s Jaron Johnson, losing by a 10-8 final score. At 130 pounds, Avery’s Forrest Sickler continued his string of well-wrestled matches, but Draughn’s Derrick Levan managed to escape with a narrow 9-7 win. Anthony Varacalli, the Big Red’s winningest wrestler thus far this season, took on Draughn’s Tyler Carey at 145 pounds. Carey came out on top in a low scoring affair by the final match score of 4-2.
The Vikings will wrestle in a pair of pre-Christmas tournaments in the next two weeks.
