Jay clips the Falcons (12/12/2008)

There was a lot to get excited about.

Jay County High School's wrestling team handed the Winchester Golden Falcons their first loss Thursday, 50-27.

The Patriots scored pins in seven of their nine victories.

And perhaps most importantly, they wrestled with intensity.

"I was impressed," said JCHS coach James Myers. "We won a lot (of matches). We came out and got a pin (in the first match) and I think that got some momentum going.

"Even though we lost a handful of matches, we competed and wrestled well. I think this is the best match we've wrestled."

Dylan Derrickson wrestled the opening match at 160 pounds, and trailed 2-1 at the close of the first period. However, he got a quick reversal to open the second period and pinned Zach Boyd in 2-minutes, 20 seconds.

That win started a run of three consecutive pins for the Patriots as Ben Theurer (145) dominated Mason Hummel in 1:07. Skylar Finnerty got two first-period near falls to build an 8-0 lead before pinning Garren Harter 50 seconds into the second period in the 152-pound match.

Michael Daniels came up with a big win at 160 pounds as his takedown with just seven seconds remaining gave him a 3-2 victory. Sha White followed by pinning Dennis Bosner in 1:34 at 171 points to give Jay County a 27-0 lead.

Winchester clawed back into the match with the strength of its upper weight classes, including 2008 state runner-up Adam Chalfant (HWT). And in previous matches this year the Golden Falcons would have tied the score by picking up a six-point forfeit at 112 pounds.

However, Jay County filled the weight class for the first time all season Thursday and Christian Fischer did not disappoint. The junior, who has wrestled for the Jay County club team but not the high school squad, pinned Daniel Wallace in just 1:10 to push the Patriot advantage to 33-21.

"That's a 12-point swing," said Myers. "That's great.

"Once he gets in the room and can fine-tune some things, I think he can be good for us."

Both Casey Kenney and Brian Terhar of the Golden Falcons weighed in at 119 pounds, but when Terhar moved up to 125 Kenney followed him. The JCHS senior, who was the state runner-up at 103 pounds last season, tossed Terhar with a fireman's carry within the first 10 seconds and built an 11-2 first-period lead before scoring the pin in 2:37.

"We wanted to wrestle him," said Myers. "Bumping him up is something we're going to do throughout the season if we can."

Caleb Culy (130) pinned and Cameron Pfeifer (135) dominated their first periods to lead by scores of 9-1 and 10-2 respectively. Culy finished off Tim Baker in 3:35, and Pfeifer topped Jordan Simmons with a 17-2 technical fall.

Junior varsity

Jay County couldn't recover from losing the first five of the 11 matches, but still came up with three pins in a 36-24 defeat.

Jon Hawn (215) scored the fastest of the Patriot pins, finishing off Nick Simmons in one minute flat. Zach Ainsworth (189) also won in the opening period by defeated Jack Underwook in 1-minute, 36 seconds.

Frank Sammons (171) pinned Josh Padgett in 3:28, and Adam Michael (HWT) won by default when Josh Williams could not continue.[[In-content Ad]]