(Photo: Travis David V Whittaker/WCSN)
“Gettin’ close, Gettin’ close,” muttered Arizona State wrestling coach Zeke Jones after his matmen fell to the University of Michigan 23-12 Saturday night.
“It’s a game of inches with the best teams,” said Jones. “We gotta take care of the small things. Overall, we are improving, and we need to get better.
In a season with top-ranked schools on the schedule, so far it’s not where many envisioned for the team to be at on a national level.
So far, ASU has dropped duals to No. 3 Ohio State, No. 13 North Carolina, No. 1 Penn State and now No. 5 Michigan.
“We are getting battle tested with these better teams,” said Jones. “We’re figuring out what the best guys are doing, how they are doing it. Obviously when you wrestle the best you find out exactly what you need to work on. I know come to the NCAA tournament we will be ready because we have felt everything, but we have to make these improvements.”
Jones knows it’s not what happens now, it’s what happens in March and what you do now to fix the mistakes so when it comes down to crunch time you compete with house-money in Pittsburgh.
Arizona State opened the dual with four straight decisions to race out to a 12-3 lead after five matches.
Starting the dual at the 157-lb weight class, No. 15 ranked Christian Pagdilao upset No. 6 ranked Alec Pantaleo, fifth-ranked Josh Shields followed up that performance with another huge win after defeating seventh-ranked Logan Massa.
Massa was a top three finisher at the NCAA’s a few seasons ago in St. Louis.
No. 2 ranked Zahid Valencia defeated No. 3 ranked Myles Amine and unranked Jacen Peterson took care of business after dispatching Reece Hughes 4-0.
“I’ve had tough opponents all year and to come out on top is definitely a confidence booster,” said Pagdilao. “I still have a way to go but it’s a step in the right direction.”
For Sheilds, it doesn’t come to much surprise with his performance as he was an All-American last year, however, moving up a weight class and beating other All-Americans from seasons past gives him insight on what to expect come March at the NCAA’s.
“It’s huge. Last season I [was] an All-American at 157 and to come up and get a win at 165 against someone who has already done it gives me some confidence,” said Shields
Jones felt that Pagdilao left points out there on the mat along with many other ASU wrestlers.
“That was [Pagdilao’s] chance to dominate an All-American.” said Jones, “I think in those first several weight classes we were just trying to win. We weren’t trying to get bonus.”
Jones felt that Shields did what he was supposed to do against an All-American.
During the stretch of four straight wins, ASU was tough on the top position after getting takedowns, however, didn’t work hard enough on the top position to score.
Michigan was dinged for stalling several times but ASU never worked to get into position for the big point moves.
“I thought we took it to them in those first four weight classes,” said Jones. “It was the reverse in the last five or six. We got rode and didn’t take care of the small things.”
Had ASU gone after a few more points and had bonus point victories they could have put themselves in position to still win the dual late even though they dropped the last six matches of the dual.
ASU 125-lb. Brandon Courtney was in on a few shots in the end as he dropped a close 9-7 decision to No. 11 ranked Drew Mattin. 149-pounder Josh Maruca also dropped a narrow decision to Malik Amine.
ASU will now head out to Hampton, Virginia, for the Virginia duals next weekend before they open up the conference season at Oregon State on Jan. 20.
