At final count, the Tigers had eight placers – three champions, two second-place, one third-place, and two fourth-place finishers. Taking second were Josh Rodriguez at 174 pounds and Cash Drylie at 197 pounds. Joey Dozier claimed third at 149 pounds, while Garrett Jones (133) and Bradley Little (157) each claimed fourth.
To earn All-MIAA status, wrestlers have to finish in the top three. Those honors go to Killip, Inman, Page, Rodriguez, Drylie, and Dozier.
As a team, the Tigers finished third handily with 70.5 points, only behind champion Nebraska-Kearney (91.5) and Lindenwood (82). Central Oklahoma was fourth at 51, and then Central Missouri and Newman in fifth and sixth respectively to round out the six-team standings.
Scoring was hard to come by in the 141-pound final. After a scoreless first period, Noah Killip controlled his opponent throughout the entire second period to gain two minutes of riding time. In the process he nearly pinned his opponent, No. 5 ranked Kyle Webb of Lindenwood, with three nearfall points in the period to take a 3-0 lead. Webb countered in the third by controlling Killip for nearly the entire period, wiping out Killip’s potential riding time point. However, Webb could not find a scoring opportunity and a stall point was all he earned. Killip took the match by a 3-1 decision.
At 174 pounds, No. 7 ranked Josh Rodriguez looked as though he was going to give FHSU four champions on the day, getting a takedown in the third period with 10 seconds remaining to take a 5-4 lead on Archie Williams of Central Missouri. However, Williams escaped just a few seconds before the final buzzer to tie the match and force overtime where he used a duck-under move to score the sudden victory takedown on Rodriguez, a 7-5 decision.
Jon Inman looked to be cruising to a victory at 184 pounds against John McArdle of Lindenwood, up 6-2 after two periods. However, McArdle used a flurry of moves late to get the match tied 7-7, but Inman’s dominance early in the match was too much as he had a enough riding time accumulated for an extra point, winning 8-7. Inman avenged a loss to McArdle in last year’s MIAA Tournament Final, when he lost late on a pin even though he had the lead in the match.
Cash Drylie used an upset in the semifinals at 197 pounds to reach the finals. He knocked off fourth-ranked Kenny Breaux of Lindenwood with a fall at 4:00 to get a match with the No. 1 ranked wrestler in the nation, Romero Cotton of Nebraska-Kearney. Cotton was too much for Drylie in the championship, scoring a 13-2 major decision.
Trey Page dominated in the finals at heavyweight, running his season record to 41-2 overall. He shutout Jacob Borgmeyer of Lindenwood with a third-period tech fall of 15-0. It was his 12thtechnical fall of the season.
Winning the third-place match at 149 pounds with a 9-5 decision was Joey Dozier. Dozier lost his semifinal match against Destin McCauley of UNK before knocking off Jared Mestas of Lindenwood for the consolation bracket win.