The Eastern Michigan University wresting team traveled to Edinboro, PA and ended their regular season strong with five wrestlers placing out of 17. Those that placed included Jake Byers, Vincent Pizzuto, Mike Curby, Nick Whitenberg and Wes Shroeder.
The team had both red shirt freshman Byers, and true freshman Pizzuto placing in the 133-pound weight class with Byers taking fifth and Pizzuto taking fourth. The two teammates have wrestled each other before, with Pizzuto edging Byers 5-4.
“Pizzuto who is normally 125 actually had to bump up a weight class to 133 at this tournament and did great,” said head coach Derek DelPorto. Red shirt freshman Curby also had a successful day coming in fifth place in the 184-pound weight class.
The big win of the day was red shirt sophomore Whitenberg taking first place in the 197-pound weight class.
“This was huge because Whitenberg won five matches on the day which is huge for us,” Coach DelPorto said. “It was really big wins because he didn’t even let up one take down on the day and even beat at top twenty guy at his weight class. He beat Nick McDiarmid from Michigan State 3-2 which is a great win.”
Shroeder also placed that day in the heavy weight class coming in second. Coach DelPorto was very pleased with Shroeder’s win over another wrestler ranked top twenty in the nation.
“He took down a tough kid in a real close match from University of Michigan- heavy weight Nick Andrus,” DelPorto said.
He continued, “We only brought four of our starters with us and it was a good outing and it was the last event of the year and they got a good showing and they all performed. I don’t know how we will perform at the MAC individuals, but I hope that we can do good and get five guys in the national.”
Overall, Coach DelPorto has been pleased by the hard work and dedication the team has shown. They have improved greatly this season, posting a team record of 14-6.
When asked the extent to which the team improved this year DelPorto stated, “Last year we were unlucky and we had a lot of injuries. We never really pieced together the things changed this year we needed a bunch of guys and they all stayed healthy and started buying into the system and its really started paying off.”
The team hopes to continue its success this year on March 4 at the MAC Championship.
