Michigan Grappler's Disney Duals Recap
AAU Disney Duals
June 23-27, 2008
Orlando, FL
6/30 - It was a crazy week in Disney that saw some of Michigan's best preps take on some of the best that Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and other top states had to offer. Many of Michigan's household names were in attendance and continued to excel on the national stage, however, there were also many Michigan grapplers relatively new to the national competetion that made a name for themself and showed the kind of depth that our state has. Following Michigan's 2nd place finish at Senior Nationals, this Disney Duals performance further solidfies that the state of Michigan belongs mentioned in the same breath as the Ohios and PAs of the wrestling world. Michigan Red finished 2nd, Blue finished 4th, and Freeze finished 6th...however, it is not the team finishes that are as impressive as the way that all our teams competed against some of the top Ohio and Pennsyvlania wrestlers. All of our squads were right in the hunt with the championship Ohio Samsons team and many top name, top ranked wrestlers were knocked off by less nationally known Michigan guys.
There were many notable individual performances to mention and we cannot note them all, so the following is just a brief overview of some of this year's highlights from the Disney Duals.
Bennett, Burge, Weber leave no doubt
Three of Michigan's biggest names showed up for this year's duals and proved why they are ranked among the top of their weight nationally. Ben Bennett (#3 @ 171), Mark Weber (#5 @ 135), and Jacob Burge (#6 @ 171) all went undefeated on the week in dominant fashion. Weber was up two weights from his season class of 135 as he wrestled 145 (5lb allowance means guys weighed in at 150) and still tore through the competetion.
Bennett and Burge were the anchors that propelled Red to the finals as they combined for a 24-0 record with only 7 of their matches going the distance the whole week. Both wrestlers, who are ranked 3rd and 6th at 171lbs nationally right now, split time at 171 and 189 so they wrestled some top tier 189lbers as well last week. Bennett knocked off Cody Magrum of Ohio, who is top 10 ranked nationally at 189. Burge was voted the tournament's most outstanding wrestler. Both of these guys will be will wrestling D1 next year with Bennett at Central Michigan and Burge heading south to North Carolina State.
Weber sat out some matches at 145 for Freeze, letting Jake Jeske get some matches in during the preliminary competetion. However, in the big duals he wrestled and wrestled well. His two closest matches all week came to Michigan guys as Jeremy Bommarito and Jake Varilek, both Division 1 state champs at 145 and 152, lost 4-2 to Weber. Weber will be wrestling at the University of Michigan next year.
Senior Class shows depth
While Bennett, Burge, and Weber stayed true to form with their impressive performances, the rest of the top seniors that wrestled in Disney were equally impressive as they all solidified Michigan's Senior National finish from this spring. Most notables were Alex Ortman and Donnie Corby, both of which have gotten little national recognition throughout their careers, who went undefeated on the week. Ortman, a 2x D1 state champ who will be wrestling for EMU next year, didnt have a match go the distance until the final day of competetion. In the finals against Ohio Samsons Ortman knocked off Ohio state champ and MSU recruit Kirk Tank 4-1. Corby, who will be wrestling at Central Michigan next year, picked up a couple big wins along the way as well. He dominated Ohio state champ Harrison Hightower 11-1...Hightower is ranked 12th nationally among sophomore 135lbers.
Also, lets not forget about Senior National runner-up Travis Pettengill and Sr National All-American Zac Stevens. Pettengill may have suffered two losses on the week, but he still picked up some big wins along the way. He avenged a Disney loss from a year ago as he beat Adam Cogar of Ohio. Cogar is a senior ranked top 20 nationally in the All-Class rankings. Stevens finished 11-1, suffering his lone loss to Evan Yenolevich of PA, who lost to other wrestlers that Stevens defeated. Yenolevich is one of the top juniors in the country and took 4th at the NHSCA Jr Nationals.
Some other notable seniors who put together 9+ win performances on the week were state champs Jeremy Bommarito, Jake Varilek, Garrett Rozeboom, and Steve Light. Hesperia big man Rudy Spaulding had a strong showing at heavyweight as well. This senior class is arguably the most star-studded and deepest Michigan has ever seen, and that was on display last week in Disney.
Freshman-to-be Jordan Thomas gives a little taste of whats to come
This year's incoming freshman class contatins a couple highly touted freshman in Jordan Thomas of Greenville and Taylor Massa of St Johns. The thing that makes these two unique is that they have the potential to win state titles as freshman at senior dominated weight classes.
Thomas wrestled last week at Disney for Team Freeze and finished an impressive 9-2 as he was competetive with some of the best prep wrestlers in the country. One of Thomas' two losses came to 2x Ohio State Champ Richie Spicel of Ohio, who was a senior this year and ranked as one of the Top 50 recruits in the country by InterMat. Thomas lost to Spicel 3-2...next fall when Thomas is a new freshman at Greenville High School Spicel will be a new freshman on the college campus of UNC-Greensboro, where he will be wrestling. The only other loss Thomas suffered was from Michigan's own Brandon Zeerip of Hesperia. Zeerip is ranked as the #5 junior 145lber in the country and in the newly released InterMat top 100 recruits for 08-09, Zeerip landed in the top 60. Thomas' loss to Zeerip was close as well with a final score of 6-4.
Thomas had some big wins as well as he defeated the 8th ranked sophomore in the country, David Habat of Ohio. Habat finished 3rd in the state this year in Ohio's Division 1 as a sophomore. Thomas also defeated Michigan state champ Garrett Rozeboom of Mason. Rozeboom is a graduated senior who was a 3x D2 state placer and amassed over 200 wins in his prep career, he was also a match away from being an all-american at Senior Nationals...Thomas beat him 3-2. So the moral of the story is that Jordan Thomas has officially arrived, he has proved that he can and will compete with the best wrestlers in the country. Stay tuned, you will be hearing alot more about this kid in the coming years...
Top Juniors make a statement
This year's group of juniors who will be next year's recruiting class are very deep, however, entering this summer almost all of the top juniors needed to get some national exposure and many did that last week in Disney.
One of the most impressive individual performances by a Michigander came from Goodrich's Kyler Elsworth. Elsworth entered the tournament as the 5th ranked Junior 189lber in the country, and he lived up to that ranking. The only loss he suffered came from fellow Michigander, Sr National Runner-Up Travis Pettengill when Freeze bumped Elsworth up to 215 in a strategic move to try and pick up a win to beat Red (it was either Ben Bennett at 189 or Pettengill at 215). Elsworth's biggest wins on the week both came against Ohio guys as he first handled the #2 ranked sophomore 189lber Cody Lamberg 7-4 and then knocked off 2x Ohio state champ Cody Magrum who is the 9th ranked 189lber in the country across all grades and will be wreslting at Ohio State next year. These wins solidify Elsworth's ranking and show that he is capable of competing with the best in the country.
Hesperia's Brandon Zeerip's week could be classified as a "breakout". Zeerip wrestled a loaded 140lb weight class that pitted him against a handful of nationally ranked guys. He finished 11-1 with his one loss coming to Florida's Kendrick Sanders, who went undefeated on the week. Zeerip's notable wins include a 4-2 decision over Ohio 2xer Richie Spicel (see Thomas write up above for more info on Spicel) and an 8-5 decision over nationally ranked sophomore Nick Sulzer. Zeerip also held off Jordan Thomas with a 6-4 win.
There were a few other juniors who picked up notable wins on the week. Mason's Craig Eifert defeated Sophomore National Champ Louis Trujillo of New Mexico as well as PA state champ Cortland Choate, who is the 9th ranked 125lber in InterMat's final All-Class rankings. Eifert finished the week 10-2 overall. 3x state champ Kyle Waldo of Rockford also looked good as he went 11-1 with his only loss coming from Ohio's James Ingram. D3 state champ Andrew Schutt of Yale went 10-2 at 130 losing only to Christian Cullinan and Ohio state placer Scott Meyer. Schutt picked up a huge win Cortland Choate of PA as wel. Dillon Kern of Fowlerville and Jared Germaine of Swan Valley both had strong showings as well going 9-3 and 8-3, respectively.
Super Sophomores get some expierence
This year's Disney Duals featured a great showing from some of Michigan's top sophomores as Tyler Keselring, BJ Suitor, Darius Wass, Ryan Olep, and John Rizgallah all earned medals. Suitor picked up the biggest win of his career when he knocked off the 11th ranked 103lber in the country in Ty Mitch of Ohio 5-0. Kesselring only lost once on the week and picked up some big wins as well. Rizgallah avenged his state semifinal loss to Olep as he won this time around when Red met up with Freeze on the final day. Another sophomore to pick up a big win was D2 State Runner Up Nick McDiarmid who knocked off 19th ranked Adam Cogar of Ohio 1-0.
Disney Duals Final Individual Records:
Freeze
103: BJ Suitor - 9-2 (Bronze)
112: Darius Wass - 8-3 (Copper)
119: Jared Germaine - 8-3 (Copper)
125: Ryan Nieman – 5-5
125: Zach Crim - 8-1
130: Christian Cullinen - 7-3 (Copper)
135: Donnie Corby - 11-0 (Gold)
140: Jordan Thomas - 9-2 (Bronze)
145: Mark Weber - 9-0 (Gold)
145 Jake Jeske – 2-2
152: Corey Robnson – 5-3
160: Ryan Olep - 8-3 (Copper)
171 Bryant Craft – 4-6
189 Kyler Elsworth - 9-2 (Bronze)
215 Jeff Beebe 5-3
285 Tarek Aluri 1-7
Red
103: Chase Snider 4-8
112: Kyle Waldo 11-1 (Silver)
119: Brett Marsh 8-4
125: Zach Johnson 6-6
130: Andrew Schutt 10-2 (Bronze)
135: Garrett Schaner 4-4
135: Billy Osborne 1-3
140: Brandon Zeerip 11-1 (Silver)
145 Jeremy Bommarito 9-2 (Copper)
152 Alex Ortman 12-0 (Gold)
160 John Rizgallah 11-1 (Silver)
171/189 Jacob Burge 12-0 (Gold)
171/189 Ben Bennett 12-0 (Gold)
215 Travis Pettengill 10-2 (Bronze)
285 Rudy Spalding 9-3 (Copper)
Blue
103 Chris Rau 8-4
112: Tyler Keselring 11-1 (Silver)
119: Zac Stevens 11-1 (Silver)
125: Steve Light 9-3 (Copper)
130: Craig Eifert 10-2 (Bronze)
135: Josh Houldsworth 6-6
140: Garrett Rozeboom 9-3 (Copper)
145: Justin Mc Dermitt 9-3 (Copper)
152: Jake Varilek 9-3 (Copper)
160: Jake Bohn 5-5
171: Dillion Kern 9-3 (Copper)
189: Evan Gros 3-9
215: Nick McDiarmid 7-4
285 DJ Charneski 7-3 (Copper)
