By TOMMY REZAC
St. Joseph Post
ST. JOSEPH - The Cameron wrestling team tallied 340 total points and had six wrestlers place first, as the Dragons won the Midland Empire Conference wrestling tournament for a third straight year Saturday at Benton High School.
Ryker Smith (120), Kenton Gates (145), Kolby Robinson (160), Paul Viena (170), Wyatt Burnett (220) and Camren Hedgpeth (285) all took gold Saturday.
Hedgpeth, a state qualifier last season, took gold at 285 Saturday after doing so at 195 in the MEC tournament in 2020.
Sam Erickson (106), Caleb Husch (113), Chase Short (132), Brecken Gates (138), Benton Barton (152) and Keegan Reynolds (195) all finished finished second for the Dragons, who've been dominant at the MEC tournament through recent years.
They were fairly dominant Saturday with a combined 40 pins as a team.
"We're consistent for sure," Cameron wrestling coach Phillip Limb said. "Kids step up. Every year, we graduate some kids and young kids step in and fill the void. (MEC) is always something on the calendar that we shoot for. Kids wrestled well today, and came out on top."
Saturday was a day of other milestones for Cameron. Senior Kolby Robinson earned his 100th career win while senior Keegan Reynolds got career win No. 150.
Reynolds lost to Maryville's Keiren Watkins in the final, 3-2, but is overall grateful to reach such a landmark in his career.
"I'm very happy about that," Reynolds said. "I'm just glad I have something that says (the hard work) is paying off. To get to 100 career wins is amazing, and to be on the wall with all of the legends and get into the top five of the all-time wins (in school history) is amazing for me.
"I wrestled as hard as I could. It was a great day. I'm walking out of here with a second place medal, so hopefully next time I'll do better."
Chillicothe placed second as a team with 213.5 points, Savannah third (157), Lafayette fourth (150.5), Maryville fifth (150), Benton sixth (135) and St. Pius X seventh (82).
Savannah's Will Courtney (126), who placed second on the day, earned his 100th career win. Gage Schottel (106) and Chance Phillips (132) took home gold for the Savages.
For Lafayette, freshman Marco Dalakishvili (126) and senior Jay Greiner (182) placed first, while senior Andy Nyugen (120) placed second.
Greiner placed second at state in 2020 at 145 pounds.
Benton's Tyler Murphy (138), who also finished second at state last year at 126, repeated as MEC champion, while Bishop Rush (145) finished second.
Maryville senior Keiren Watkins, who placed first at 195, was named the MEC tournament's Most Outstanding Wrestler. Drew Spire (160) and Kort Watkins (285) placed second for the Spoofhounds.
