Ison 3rd at state finals

ARCADIA — Tricia Ison became just the second Patriot to win a regional title.

On Friday, she was the team’s top finisher at the state tournament.

Ison, a Jay County High School junior, split her two contested matches at the Indiana High School Girls Wrestling state finals at Hamilton Heights to place third at 170 pounds.

All four Patriot wrestlers who competed at the state finals finished in the top four.

Ison, who won the 170-pound title at last weekend’s regional at Maconaquah and came into the state finals ranked third, moved automatically to the semifinals because there were only seven competitors in her state bracket. She dropped her first match of the evening to Northview’s Mercedes Tellechea by pin in 5 minutes, 2 seconds.

She bounced back from the defeat to win the third-place match, pinning Penn’s Madison Hazeltine in 2:39.

Lizzie Dollar, also a junior, and senior Lita Chowning each won their opening round matches with pins. The second-ranked Dollar pinned Frankfort’s Eryka Pillion in 5:20 while Chowning, ranked eighth, finished off fifth-ranked Jasmine Hermosillo of Decatur Central in 5 minutes even.

They both dropped their next two matches.

Chowning’s semifinal loss came by pin in 2:17 to eventual state champion Catie Campbell of North Montgomery.

She then suffered a pin in 2:01 to No. 4 Tay Coatie of Carmel in the third-place match.

Dollar, who had been the state runner-up each of the last two years, dropped her semifinal bout by a tight 2-1 decision to fourth-ranked Kylie Smith-Foster of Greenfield. She went on to lose her third-place match to No. 5 Adriana Sanchez of Purdue Polytechnic by a 5-3 decision.

Freshman Mollie Hines advanced through the first round thanks to a forfeit by Centerville’s second-ranked Hannah Stapleton. She then lost by pins in 1:33 and 1:20 to Delta’s No. 3 Kelsey Temple and Cloverdale’s No. 7 Kadawn Gao, respectively.