North Carolina State University Athletics
UNC Greensboro Trips Wrestling 23-17
2/13/2008 12:00:00 AM | Wrestling
The Wolfpack lost its third match in a row and fell to 8-10-1 for the season. The Spartans improved to 9-7.
The match got off to a poor start for the Wolfpack when 125-pounder Taylor Cummings wound up getting pinned by Mitchell Johnson from a neutral position with three seconds remaining in the first period. No. 16 Jeff Hedges made it 9-0 UNCG with a 6-4 decision over NC State’s Darius Little in the 133-pound match.
Joe Caramanica, ranked No. 5 nationally at 141, got NC State on the board with a 17-2 technical fall as time expired in the final period. Caramanica won for the 71st time in his career, which ranks 20th in school history. With the Wolfpack in the scoring column, Darrion Caldwell gave the Wolfpack the lead at 11-9 when he pinned Marcus Hannah at 1:43 at 149 pounds. The pin was Caldwell’s eighteenth of the season, which tied him with Jayson Ness of Minnesota for the national lead in falls. Caldwell now is tied for fourth in school history with 28 career pins.
At 157, NC State’s Colton Palmer got a pair of takedowns in the first period, then salted the match away with a takedown in the third to defeat Mark Ring 7-4, and Jalil Dozier scored eight takedowns against Byron Sigmon at 165 and went on to record a 17-10 decision, extending the Wolfpack’s lead to 17-9.
UNC Greensboro snapped the Wolfpack’s momentum at 174. Mikal McKee scored a late takedown in the first period and got a three-point near fall to take a 5-0, then scored two more takedowns in the final period to win a 12-3 major decision and cut NC State’s lead to four points at 17-13. Jeremy Cannon’s 10-1 major decision over Dane Coffee at 184 tied the score at 17-17 with two matches remaining.
The first of those was at 197, where UNCG’s Daren Burns is ranked No. 13 nationally. The Wolfpack’s Mark Jahad made it a match, but Burns scored the only point of the match with an escape to start the third period and won a 1-0 decision. The win was the 100th of Burns’s career, making him the first wrestler in UNCG history to win 100 matches in a career.
With UNCG leading 20-17, the match came down to the heavyweight bout between NC State’s Bobby Isola and UNCG’s Ryan Hsu, and Hsu used an escape and subsequent takedown in the final period to record a 5-2 decision and give the Spartans a 23-17 victory.
NC State will return to action on Friday for its regular-season finale against ACC opponent Virginia Tech. The match, which will begin at 7:30 p.m., will be held at Reynolds Coliseum.
UNC Greensboro 23, NC State 17
125 Mitchell Johnson (UNCG) pinned Taylor Cummings, at 2:57
133 #16 Jeff Hedges (UNCG) dec. Darius Little, 6-4
141 #5 Joe Caramanica (NCS) tech fall Ben Wilmore, 17-2, at 7:00
149 #9 Darrion Caldwell (NCS) pinned Marcus Hannah, at 1:43
157 Colton Palmer (NCS) dec. Mark Ring, 7-4
165 Jalil Dozier (NCS) dec. Byron Sigmon, 17-10
174 Mikal McKee (UNCG) major dec. Ray Ward, 12-3
184 Jeremy Cannon (UNCG) major dec. Dane Coffee, 10-1
197 #13 Daren Burns (UNCG) dec. Mark Jahad, 1-0
Hwt Ryan Hsu (UNCG) dec. Bobby Isola, 5-2
