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PITTSBURG —
Pittsburg hosts Labette County and Parsons tonight on the final night of the Southeast Kansas League wrestling regular season.
The Purple Dragons (6-0 overall, 6-0 SEK) have a direct claim on their second consecutive SEK League title — beat Labette County (3-8, 1-5) and beat Parsons (3-11, 1-5) and Pittsburg completes a back-to-back undefeated run through SEK duals.
“We’ve had good practices,” Pittsburg head coach Scott Rieck said, referring to no competition against other schools since Jan. 28. “We’ve hit it really hard. Kids are stepping up and they’re performing well in the room.”
Rieck said he thought his full lineup would be returning for the first time since winning the Emporia tourney in December, but a top-ranked state wrestler and defending state champion will not be wrestling tonight.
“(Aaron) Seybold got tweaked a little bit at practice (Tuesday night),” Rieck said. “He won’t be going (tonight). I feel bad because it would be his last time performing at home and he won’t be able to have that opportunity, but as far as the collective whole, it’s not’s going to affect us that much because we’re deep up and down.
“He’ll be good for Regionals. He pulled some intercostal muscles in his ribs.”
However, a three-time state qualifier and a state qualifier from last year will be up on center stage tonight.
“We’ve got (Brent) Koehn back in the room,” Rieck said. “He started going live last night. He’d been drilling the last week. Gershom’s (Gershom Avalos) elbow is looking good. He’s back wrestling live this past week. We get Seybold back and we’re ready to roll.”
The more Rieck talked about team health on Wednesday afternoon, the more reflective he got on the overall quality of the Pittsburg wrestling program, ranked No. 3 in Class 4A behind Andale and McPherson.
“This year, I was thinking about it, we’ve had our full squad for two competitions — that was Gardner where we placed higher than any state (Kansas) team and Emporia where we won the tournament,” Rieck said. “The rest of the year, we’ve been hitting these tournaments and getting seconds and thirds with two or three guys out each time. It will be interesting to see how we do regional and state time with a full lineup again.”
Parsons features Thatcher Murdock at 132 pounds and Dalton Murdock at 138, both of whom placed sixth in Class 4A at their respective weights of 130 and 125. Thatcher Murdock currently ranks fifth in Class 4A.
Pittsburg hosts Labette County and Parsons tonight on the final night of the Southeast Kansas League wrestling regular season.
The Purple Dragons (6-0 overall, 6-0 SEK) have a direct claim on their second consecutive SEK League title — beat Labette County (3-8, 1-5) and beat Parsons (3-11, 1-5) and Pittsburg completes a back-to-back undefeated run through SEK duals.
“We’ve had good practices,” Pittsburg head coach Scott Rieck said, referring to no competition against other schools since Jan. 28. “We’ve hit it really hard. Kids are stepping up and they’re performing well in the room.”
Rieck said he thought his full lineup would be returning for the first time since winning the Emporia tourney in December, but a top-ranked state wrestler and defending state champion will not be wrestling tonight.
“(Aaron) Seybold got tweaked a little bit at practice (Tuesday night),” Rieck said. “He won’t be going (tonight). I feel bad because it would be his last time performing at home and he won’t be able to have that opportunity, but as far as the collective whole, it’s not’s going to affect us that much because we’re deep up and down.
“He’ll be good for Regionals. He pulled some intercostal muscles in his ribs.”
However, a three-time state qualifier and a state qualifier from last year will be up on center stage tonight.
“We’ve got (Brent) Koehn back in the room,” Rieck said. “He started going live last night. He’d been drilling the last week. Gershom’s (Gershom Avalos) elbow is looking good. He’s back wrestling live this past week. We get Seybold back and we’re ready to roll.”
The more Rieck talked about team health on Wednesday afternoon, the more reflective he got on the overall quality of the Pittsburg wrestling program, ranked No. 3 in Class 4A behind Andale and McPherson.
“This year, I was thinking about it, we’ve had our full squad for two competitions — that was Gardner where we placed higher than any state (Kansas) team and Emporia where we won the tournament,” Rieck said. “The rest of the year, we’ve been hitting these tournaments and getting seconds and thirds with two or three guys out each time. It will be interesting to see how we do regional and state time with a full lineup again.”
Parsons features Thatcher Murdock at 132 pounds and Dalton Murdock at 138, both of whom placed sixth in Class 4A at their respective weights of 130 and 125. Thatcher Murdock currently ranks fifth in Class 4A.
“We’ll have Jacob Wools wrestle one and it’s an important match because it will be seed criteria at the regional tournament,” Rieck said. “Otherwise, he’ll probably pull a No. 4 seed and have to wrestle (Jacob) Durossette (of Fort Scott) in the semis. We have Kevin Barker in at 138 and he’s a seasoned kid. He’s just not a true 38 pounder as far as size goes, but as far as his years of wrestling, he’ll do real well at that weight.”
Labette County features No. 5-ranked heavyweight Spencer Gatewood and it could be a true battle of the heavyweights tonight between Gatewood and No. 2-ranked heavyweight Broc Bennett of Pittsburg.
“It will be interesting how him and Broc match up,” Rieck said. “That’s Broc’s last true test before Regionals. I have total faith in Broc and it will be good for him to get one more good one in before the regional tournament.”
Labette County and Parsons open the double dual at 5:30 p.m., with Pittsburg and Labette County starting at approximately 6:30 and Pittsburg and Parsons starting at approximately 7:40.
Pittsburg will be wrestling in the Fort Scott Regional (Feb. 17-18) featuring the host, Anderson County, Chanute, Coffeyville, Columbus, Independence, Iola, Labette County, Louisburg, Osawatomie, Ottawa, Paola, Parsons and Prairie View.
“To be honest with you, we’ve been going from week-to-week,” Rieck said. “Like up on the white board right now, it’s about what’s going on for (tonight). We haven’t talked or focused on Regionals too much other than making sure that when you have a regional guy, we beat that regional guy for seeding purposes.”
SEK League Wrestling
School SEK Overall
Pittsburg 6-0 6-0
Fort Scott 5-1 11-5
Chanute 5-1 10-6
Columbus 4-2 5-5
Iola 3-3 8-4
Independence 2-4 3-5
Labette County1-5 3-8
Parsons 1-5 3-11
Coffeyville 0-5 0-5
Tonight
Chanute and Fort Scott at Columbus
Coffeyville and Independence at Iola
Labette County and Parsons at Pittsburg
