SERENA HOFDAHL
WSU club wrestlers practice on Feb. 24 in the Physical Education Building. The team’s coach won Northwest Conference Men’s Coach of the Year.
WSU club wrestlers qualified
Sunday for a national wrestling tournament and their coach won Coach of the
Year.
On Sunday, 18 WSU
wrestlers traveled to Aberdeen, Washington, to compete in the National
Collegiate Wrestling Association (NCWA) Northwest Conference Championship. All
wrestlers placed in the top six and 12 qualified for the national tournament.
Two wrestlers took first
place: freshman James Cox in the 149-pound weight class and junior Cameron
Dubos in the 157-pound weight class.
The wrestling team
finished with 177.5 points, taking second place at the tournament. The team finished
11 points short of first place out of 10 teams, with Grays Harbor College
taking first with 188.5 points.
“We’re super proud of
what we did,” head coach Phil Burnett said.
Burnett was voted the Northwest
Conference Men’s Coach of the Year by conference coaches at the tournament. The
Northwest Conference is made up of 15 wrestling clubs from Washington, Idaho,
Oregon, and Montana.
“It’s a testimony of what
the guys have done here. This is about them,” Burnett said.
The 12 qualifiers will be
competing in the 2020 NCWA
National Championships March 11-14 in Allen, Texas at the Allen Event
Center. Brackets will consist of 64 people in each weight class.
The 12 wrestlers will include Cox, Dubos, sophomore Cade Stevenson, senior Cameron Bennett, junior Dalton Varney, junior David Woo, senior Demetrious Koures, junior Joseph Lewis, freshman Koa Ostos, junior Nic Carbone, sophomore Ryan Harris and senior Tucker Hanson.
“This is the best team we’ve taken to nationals since my involvement
here,” Burnett said.
Big Bend Community
College took third place with 132 points. Treasure Valley Community College
took fourth with 67.5 points. Western Washington University took fifth with 49
points. Pacific Luther University sixth place with 30 points.
Central Washington University took seventh place with 27.5 points. Eastern Washington University took eighth place with 10.5 points. University of Oregon took ninth place with four points. University of Washington finished in 10th place.
The Cougars competing in the following weight classes:
125 – Woo
133 – Koures
141 – Lewis
141 – Harris
149 – Bennett and Cox
157 – Dubos
174 – Stevenson
184 – Hanson
197 – Varney
235 – Ostos
285 – Carbone