WE ARE ADAPTIVE WRESTLING-SPECIFIC MEDIA

Champion: (3) Lake Bates North Desoto

2nd (1) Jacobi Clement East Ascension 3rd (7) Neil Borne Rummel 4th Jemarion Moore Houston Westside 5th (8) Cooper Reagan Benton 6th (2) Gabe Cuba Catholic

The seeding in this weight class is a little baffling.  If you have not figured it out yet, North Desoto's Lake Bates won as the third seed.  Versus Louisiana wrestlers, Bates had lost to Jesuit's Arthur Schott, Brother Martin's Rory Horvath, Caddo Magnet's Isaac Dees and Fontainebleau's Aiden Lindsey (whom he had also defeated once.  None of those wrestlers were present at this event.  Bates spent a lot of time out-of-state, and his overall record was 23-4, and he had victories over Lindsey and Mandeville's Mile Edwards.  Second-seeded Gabe Cuba of Catholic was seeded second.  Cuba also lost to Schott via a fall, while Bates lost 8-0 MD.  Cuba also lost to Holy Cross' Nicholas DiGeralamo, but he had four losses to out-of-state competition.  In one out-of-state tournament Cuba was not the Catholic scoring-wrestler.  In that event he placed seventh.  In the other out-of-state event, he did not place.  And he did not defeat any "name brand" wrestlers from Louisiana in dual meets or via winning the Brusly 8.  This is not to say Cuba is not a very good wrestler.  He came into the Ken Cole with a record of 22-8 record.  But how did that record elicit a better seed than Bates'?

For that matter, though, how did Bates not get the top seeding over East Ascension's Jacobi Clement?  Lake and Clement had not met head-to-head.  They had two common opponents in Lindsey and Horvath.  Bates was 1-1 against Lindsey whereas Clement was 0-1.  Horvath beat Bates 8-3 whereas he pinned Clement.  The Lindsey/Horvath/Clement/Bates matches all occurred at the LACL.  Bates finished in sixth-place after a 4-2 loss to Lindsey.   Clement, after he fell to Lindsey in 4:21, did not place in the top-six at the LACL.  So why was Clement seeded better than Bates?

Clement did cruise into the finals via four falls.  Bates had to work harder, using two falls and decision of 9-3 and 5-3.  But in the finals, it was all Bates.  Jacobi scored the first takedown, but his lead would only last for 1:14 after Bates escaped and took him down to end the first period.  Bates then held Clement to an escape while rolling up nine points of his own for a 12-3 MD championship.

Seventh-seeded Neil Borne of Rummel took out Cuba 7-2 in the quarterfinals.  He then took out eighth-seeded Cooper Reagan of Benton and Houston Westside's Jemarion Moore, seeded fourth, to take third place.  Reagan defeated Cuba 6-1 to take fifth.

Semifinals

(1) Jacobi Clement (EA) pinned (4) Jeremiah Moore (WSD) in 0:57

(3) Lake Bates (ND) defeated (7) Neil Borne (RUM) 5-3

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Third-Sixth Place

(7) Neil Borne (RUM) defeated (4) Jeremiah Moore (WSD) 9-5 to place 3rd

(5) Cooper Reagan (BNT) defeated (2) Gabe Cuba (CAT) 6-1 to place 5th

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Finals

(3) Lake Bates (ND) defeated (1) Jacobi Clement (EA) 12-3 MD

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