Two Cloud County Wrestlers Advance to Saturday at NJCAA Wrestling Championships
Two Cloud County Community College wrestlers have advanced to the final day of the 2023 NJCAA Wrestling National Championships with sophomore Ibrahim Ameer just one match away from wrestling for the 197-pound National Title on Saturday night following day one action inside the Mid-America Center in Council Bluffs, Iowa on Friday, March 3rd.
As a team, Cloud County would send seven wrestlers out of 10 weight classes and see four of the seven make it through the opening session on Friday to advance to the Friday night session with Ameer and Wyatt Powell both winning their evening session matches to advance in their respective weight classes. In the team scoring, CCCC is 18th after day one with 30.5 points and are just five points back of a potential top-15 team finish. Of the eight Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference teams represented at the 2023 National Championship Tournament, CCCC trails only Pratt Community College who currently sits in second with 84.5 points, and Northwest Kansas Technical College which is in seventh with 57 total points after putting three wrestlers into Saturday morning's semifinal round.
With Ameer serving as the lone returning national qualifier for the T-Birds, the Florrisant, Missouri native would enter the tournament as the number-two seed while getting through day one a perfect 3-0 to advance to the semifinal round. Facing off against Tony Ray of Patrick & Henry in the opening round, Ameer would put on a clinic to earn an 18-2 technical fall to set up a second-round matchup and rematch with Hunter Hall of Carl Albert State for the third time this season. Picking up a 13-5 decision to advance to the evening session, Ameer would once again be tasked with a rematch of a former foe by taking on Jayshon Hines of Northwest Kansas Technical College and would earn an 8-2 decision win to stay alive in the hunt for an individual national title.
Saturday morning will see Ameer take on sixth-ranked John Lovett of Iowa Central Community College has earned three decision victories to advance to the semifinal round. The other semifinal on Saturday morning in the 197-pound bracket will pit top-ranked Michael Gasper of Clackamas against fourth-ranked Brett Mower of Iowa Western as the top half of the bracket would see just one upset through the quarterfinal round. Of the other three wrestlers still in the championship portion of the bracket, Ameer has only faced off with Gasper this season, winning 3-2 before dropping a 2-0 decision on back-to-back days at the NJCAA Coaches Duals.
CCCC's other wrestler to advance to the placement rounds on Saturday morning is 184-pound wrestler Wyatt Powell as the Mesa, Arizona native would fend off elimination five straight times on Friday after falling to top-ranked Jackson White of Northeastern Oklahoma A&M in his opening round match. Earning a disqualification win over Jarvis Echols of Bryant and Stratton, Powell would then keep his morning alive with an 18-2 technical fall over 15-seed Alex Christy of Jamestown Community College to set up a matchup with Josh Wright of Patrick & Henry in the evening session. Needing a win to advance to continue his tournament, Powell would score the only two points of the match in the opening period before going on to win by fall at the 2:36 mark of the first period to advance once more and set up a matchup with John Colburne of Iowa Lakes. Putting together a dominant opening two minutes, Powell would score a quick takedown before adding six back points in the opening period while allowing just a single point on an escape to take an 8-1 lead after three minutes of action. Colburne would respond with a takedown and a second stall call on Powell to pull back within four at 8-4 heading to the third but give up a quick escape to Powell and be unable to overcome the early deficit as Powell would trade takedowns for escapes to maintain a lead and earn a 12-8 decision.
Saturday's morning action for Powell will see an opening-round rematch with White following an upset in the quarterfinal round on Friday night. If Powell were to drop the rematch with White, he will wrestle for seventh while a win would keep the potential alive for as high as a third-place finish in his first national tournament appearance.
Other wrestlers to pick up wins in their inaugural NJCAA Wrestling Championship appearance would be Brady Foster (2-2), Dylan Ancheta (3-2), and Gabriel Bailey (2-2), Both Ancheta and Bailey would advance to the Friday evening session with Ancheta finishing one win shy of the Saturday morning placement matches after earning a 3-0 upset win over Oscar Serrano of Union Community College in the opening round to go along with a first-period fall over Samajay Allboyd of Pratt in the consolation round and 9-3 decision over Paul Ortiz in his second consolation match. In the match to advance to Saturday morning, Ancheta would face off with second-ranked Adam Busiello of Nassau Community College and end up seeing his season end by first-period fall.
As for Foster, it would be an opening-round win with an upset victory over De'Aonte Hutchinson of Jamestown Community College with an 8-0 major decision to set up a second-round matchup with top-ranked Jackason Burks of Iowa Western. Falling by technical fall to head to the consolation rounds, Foster would get a rematch from earlier in the year against Kai Matsunaga of Clackamas and earn a 10-2 major decision to make it to the evening session. In what would ultimately be his final match of the season, Foster would take on eighth-seeded Luqman Masud of Joliet Community College, dropping a 16-0 technical fall decision and coming up two wins short of the Saturday placement rounds.
Bailey would enter the tournament as the number-11 seed and be matched against South-Central District foe Justice Compton of Northeastern Oklahoma A&M to drop a 5-2 decision after leading 2-1 through five minutes of wrestling to be sent to the consolation side of the bracket. Earning a medical forfeit in his first consolation round match, Bailey would then square off with 12th-seeded Tyson Moffit of Northeastern Junior College and win by a final score of 10-4 to advance. Unfortunately for Bailey, a second-period fall in his next match against Andrew Gamble of Iowa Central would put an end to the potential comeback run for the Leavenworth, Kansas native after finishing as district runner-up three weeks ago.
What's Next?
Both Ameer and Powell will look to add points to the Cloud County team scoring total on Saturday with action set to begin again at 9 AM inside the Mid-America Center. Both wrestlers are assured at least two more matches, with Ameer potentially wrestling three more times depending on the outcome of his match with Lovett. Bailey meanwhile could finish anywhere between third and eighth in his bracket, and will at minimum tie a school record for most matches wrestled at a single National Championship Tournament with seven which is currently held by James Davis at the 2021 National Championship Tournament.