Wrangell High School wrestlers attended the Mountain City Christian Academy Invitation tournament in Anchorage this past weekend. Over the meet’s two days (Nov. 1-2), every single Wrangell wrestler won at least one match. The team also returned home with the first-place award for small teams.
This is the third time in four years that the Wolves were the recipients of the award.
Ben Houser was the team’s sole champion of the tournament. The junior finished atop the podium in the 125-pound weight class after finishing in second place in Juneau during the previous tournament.
There were 26 wrestlers in the 125-pound bracket. In the end, Houser cleared them all. He pinned all five opponents, including Seward’s Emery Kirchner, his championship match rival.
“He just looked really good,” head coach Jack Carney said. “For him to go from not placing last year to taking first, it’s kind of surreal.”
Jackson Carney and Cody Barnes each finished third in their respective weight classes, rounding out Wrangell’s podium finishers in Anchorage.
Senior captain Della Churchill finished fifth in the girls 120-pound bracket. The Wrangell standout won her first three matches before falling in the semi-final round to Palmer’s Lillie Vansiegman. Ian Nelson and Everett Meissner finished fifth in their brackets.
Hailey Cook was the lone wolf to finish fourth place at the tournament. The sophomore won three matches en route to the fourth-place finish before falling just short of a podium place.
In total, Wrangell boasted a record of 41 wins and 18 losses. The team tallied 29 pins across the 59 matches over the two days. The girls two-person team, still without freshman phenom Kourtney Barnes who remains sidelined due to injury, finished 19th out of the 30 schools in attendance.
The boys team’s point total of 134.5 vaulted them to a sixth-place finish, just four points behind Kenai. For the boys, this was especially impressive considering they only brought seven wrestlers with them to the tournament.
Wrestling is unique in that there are not divisions based on school size like there are in other sports. Meaning that when Wrangell wrestles, they wrestle against Alaska’s biggest and best, making a six-place finish more notable.
“We’re competing against teams with 500 kids in the school.” Carney said. He pointed out the nine Wrangell wrestlers who attended the tournament make up roughly one sixth of the entire high school.
Up next, the team will compete in Ketchikan on Friday and Saturday, Nov. 8-9.
“Southeast is really tough this year, so we’re going to have great competition,” he said. “We’re just trying to bring as many kids down and just get a little bit better every weekend.”
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