Greene County High School head wrestling coach Mark Sawhill talked to his wrestlers prior to Saturday’s Heart of Iowa Activities Conference tournament in Jewell. “I told them to go out and have fun. If they took care of things individually, then the team score would take care of itself. I thought we could do well with some of the individuals we have, didn’t expect to win the team title with just nine wrestlers.” That was the case as the Rams won the HOIAC tournament title for the third straight season. They crowned four champions for the second year in a row, and added three second place finishes to edge three other schools for the title.
Greene County scored 168.5 points with 167 for PCM (Monroe), 161 by Gilbert, and 156.5 from Saydel (Des Moines). Roland-Story (Story City) was fifth at 134, followed by South Hamilton with 125, North Polk (Alleman) 102, Nevada 72, CMB (Maxwell) 69, and Colfax-Mingo 57 points.
Champions for the Rams were seniors Jacob Challen (120) and Dylan Forkner (126), sophomore Tommy Bradshaw (138), and senior Jeremy Scheuermann (152). Finishing second for the Rams were junior Jordan Challen (132), junior Abe Yoder (145), and sophomore Daric Whipple (160). Senior Rene’ Guzman (285) finished fifth and freshman Hunter Ruth (170) was sixth. The individua HOIACl titles were the third for both Forkner and Scheuermann, and the first for Challen and Bradshaw.
In fourth place after round one, the Rams put together a perfect second round, going seven for seven in semifinal matches, and two for two on the consolation side of the bracket. That gave the Rams a 20-point lead and they were able to hold off the challengers.
The three year conference tournament title winning streak had not been accomplished by the Rams since 1979, ’80, and ’81 by the Jefferson Rams under the direction of Coach John Kinley.
The Rams end the regular season this week. They host PCM and C-M in the middle school gym in Jefferson on Jan. 30 at 6 p.m. in the final dual meets of the regular season, then take part in the Feb. 1 Guthrie Center Tiger Invitational. Greene County enters the postseason on Feb. 8 at 12 p.m. at a Class 2A Sectional tournament hosted by Perry.