With the sectional wrestling tournament scheduled for Saturday, the Clarke wrestling team traveled to the Southern Iowa Classic this past Saturday for a 13-team tournament.
Clarke finished eighth overall as a team with 92 team points. PCM won the event with 232 team points.
A continued bright spot in the Clarke lineup has been 138-pounder Riley Domina, who topped the podium in impressive fashion with a 58 win by pin in his first-place match.
Domina had two other wins by pin in the tournament and a win by major decision.
“Riley Domina is wrestling really well right now and it showed on Saturday. The thing he’s got to learn is getting to the sectional tournament is your first match has to be just as crisp as your last match,” said head coach Brian Reece.
Jonathan Bair and Taven Floyd both won their way to third place matches at their respective 170- and 220-pound weight classes.
Bair had two wins by fall, but dropped a 6-4 decision to Class 2A No. 2 Sage Walker of E-B-F in the semifinals that moved him back to the consolation bracket.
In his third place match, Bair just missed out on a bronze finish, dropping a 6-5 decision to Class 3A No. 9 James DeMeyer of Mount Pleasant.
“Jon is wrestling really, really well. He’s had a really strong schedule this year in terms of kids he’s wrestled,” said Reece. “He’s lost some matches here and there, but I told him Saturday you got to treat those as learning opportunities and as long as you learn from it, it doesn’t matter. It’s what happens at the end of the season that’s going to matter for where his goal are at.”
Floyd lost in the quarterfinals by a third period pin but rattled his way through the consolation side of the bracket before pulling out of the third place match with an injury.
Zethann May grabbed fifth place for Clarke at 126 with a pin in 4:25 over Gage VanVeen of Fairfield in the last match of the day.
Ethan Domina dropped his fifth-place match at 106 pounds to Caden Sales of Centerville, falling by pin late in the first round.
Moving into the week of sectionals, Reece has a lot of optimism about bringing his first full lineup as head coach.
“We are taking a full lineup, which will be the first time since I’ve coached here that we are going to fill all 14 weight classes for a sectional tournament,” said Reece. “Our goal is to compete and wrestle. We tell the kids at every single tournament we go to wrestle at or above your seed.”
Clarke will head to Carlisle on Saturday where the Indians will see Bondurant-Farrar, Carlisle, Chariton, Knoxville and Class 2A No. 1 PCM.