Wrestlers take first at Sidney

The Glasgow wrestling team won its first meet of the season, taking home the team victory at the Sidney Invitational.

The Scotties scored 170.5 points in the tournament to take the top spot. They beat out strong showings from Glendive/Terry who scored 151 and Williston, who scored 142.

Glasgow had nine of its 10 varsity wrestlers finish in the top four spots, with three coming out as victors in their weight.

“We were a little undermanned going there, without Aaron Hartsock and Jacob Bethea,” co-head coach Brady Flaten said. “So we were without two of our varsity guys. To go down there, it was one of the most dominating performances that we've seen in a while.”

The Scotties got wins from Chaz Hopstad, Tyrel Shumway and Luke Zeiger at the tournament. All three dominated their weights winning from the top spot in the bracket.

In the 130-pound division, Zeiger, who has moved up since winning the state championship at 112 pounds last season, ran through three opponents to win his weight at the tournament. The sophomore made quick work of his first two opponents, pinning his first foe in 32 seconds and his second in 2:32. In the championship match Zeiger earned a major decision over Williston's Eddie Maisey, winning the match 9-1.

Hopstad, competing at 189 pounds, earned a bye in the first round and needed just 1:26 to pin Glendive's Sundance Kemp in his first match. The championship match took a little longer but the result was the same for Hopstad, pinning Harlem's Matt Costello in 3:07.

Shumway, the Scotties' heavyweight, won in equally dominating fashion. The senior pinned Harlem's Tate Gress in 1:57 then topped that by pinning Miles City's Chris Kurkowski in 1:19.

Two more Scotties competed for championships on Saturday, but Parker Miller and Braden Hallock fell a little short finishing in second.

Earning third place finishes for the Scotties were Zeb Shawver at 119 pounds and Ryan Bergtoll at 140 pounds. Bergtoll avenged three losses from the round robin on Friday to claim third place on Saturday.

Gavin Holstein at 152 pounds and Tucker Holstein at 160 pounds finished in fourth. The only Scotty who didn't place was Simon Helland, who was moved up to the 145-pound weight class on Saturday to fill a hole for the Scotties.

“From a team standpoint we won the tournament so we met our goal,” Flaten said. “There's some kids that didn't quite meet their individual goals. There's quite a few kids on the team that their goal was to win the tournament and they didn't meet that. But Sidney's the first tournament of the year and if we were peaking and wrestling our best right now I'd be a little worried.”

Despite the win, the coaches saw some small things that still need work and will iron out some of those flaws as the season progresses.

“Getting off the bottom and not getting real high when we're on top, finishing our takedowns, those are some things we definitely didn't do that we need to,” co-head coach Byron Hallock said. “By the end of the year we'll expect all that stuff but this weekend that's stuff we need to work on.”

The Scotties host their first meet of the season this Saturday with the Glasgow Invitational at Glasgow High School.