Wrestling: Jones Takes Midlands Title
December 30, 2003 06:28 PM | General
December 30, 2003
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EVANSTON, Ill. – West Virginia University’s Greg Jones returned to the mat in impressive fashion by winning with 184-pound title at the 41st Midlands Wrestling Championships at Welsh-Ryan Arena.
Jones, wrestling in his first action of the season, won the title in a sudden victory tiebreaker match, 2-1, over Ben Heizer of Northern Illinois. Both wrestlers traded escapes for a 1-1 tie, sending the contest into overtime. The junior Mountaineer jumped out immediately from his down position in the first :30 second period to score the winning point.
"Greg’s win at the Midlands is a great start to the season for him,” says WVU assistant coach Zeke Jones. “This tournament showed Greg where he is at and what sort of things he needs to improve on.”
Also wrestling in Session 4 for the Mountaineers on Tuesday night were Joe Clarke (141) and Matt Lebe (157).
The evening contest at 157-pounds was a rematch for West Virginia’s Lebe. The sophomore again fell to fourth-seeded Matt Gentry of Stanford. Gentry would score a three-point near fall in the third period in taking the match 4-0. Lebe earned a fourth-place finish for the Mountaineers.
Clarke, wrestling in perhaps the toughest weight class of the tournament, finished sixth for WVU. The senior dropped a 4-3 decision to Dylan Long of Northern Iowa, the No. 1 seed and 2003 NCAA runner-up.
“Overall, the team wrestled pretty well,” says Zeke Jones. “We had some guys who needed some matches and the Midlands provided quality opponents for them. We still have some areas to work on and we’ll go back home and make some adjustments.”
Illinois won the team tournament title with 107.5 points. The Mountaineers finished 11th in the final team standings, despite sending just five grapplers to Evanston.
WVU returns to action on January 4, 2004, when they travel to Tempe, Ariz., to compete in the Sun Devil Duals.
