Westfield beats Carmel in dual meet, first time in over 10 years

By RICHIE HALL

WESTFIELD – The Westfield boys wrestling team picked up a dual-meet victory over Carmel on Wednesday.

The Shamrocks beat the Greyhounds 51-21 at CSI Gymnasium; it was the first time in over a decade that Westfield had beaten Carmel in a dual meet. The Shamrocks’ solid lightweights started the meet off with a bang, and that carried Westfield through to the win.

“I definitely think starting where we started with the heart of our lineup there, that really gave us a lot of momentum,” said ‘Rocks coach Tom Griffin.

Westfield won the first seven matches of the meet. Connor Maddox received a forfeit at 106 pounds, then Brayden Head edged out Carmel’s Carlo Federici in a 6-5 decision at 113. Porter Temples came up next at 120 pounds, and he got a quick fall, the first of five pins for Westfield in the meet.

Trevor Humburg won a 16-1 technical fall at 126 pounds, then 132-pounder Carter Niccum got a fast pin. Alic Washburn won at 138 by major decision, and Jake Saez picked up a 10-3 decision at 144 pounds.

The Greyhounds got on the board at 150, with Eli Penquite getting past Graydon Staley in a 7-5 decision. Westfield then got the next two matches with pins: Padraig Oatis was the 157-pound winner and Max Brown won at 165.

Carmel took the next three bouts by fall, with Michael Major (at 175), Adel Navarette (at 190) and Will Massey (at 215) all getting pins. Westfield’s Job Mavrick won the 285-pound match; after a tight first two periods, Mavrick took control late in the third to get a pin with seven seconds left.

“I think the whole team is really starting to come together,” said Griffin. “We got a lot of guys in the middle there that are new to our lineup, but as the year’s going on, they just continue to progress. You look at our records, nobody on our team’s got a losing record right now.”

“There were matches in there that we thought going into them we could compete with, and Westfield a little bit outhustled us,” said Carmel coach Ed Pendoski. “We’re going to go to work. And we know this is a good team. Their team is much more mature than ours. They did a great job of hustling and fighting. So, we’ve got things we’ve got to work on in our room, to go into the state tournament series.”

Westfield is coming off a victory at the Paul Loggan Invitational, which took place last Saturday at North Central. The Shamrocks will compete in another big tournament on Saturday, traveling to Noblesville for the Hoosier Crossroads Conference meet. Carmel heads north on Saturday to the Garrett Invitational.