Argos stick Lights in rivalry round one

If the Montana State University-Northern Lights are going to be a dominant NAIA wrestling team this season, after Wednesday night, they now know, they have some work to do.

Northern came into its annual rivalry dual with the UGF Argos Wednesday night ranked No. 4 in the country, and even without key grapplers in the lineup, the Lights were prohibitive favorites inside the friendly confines of the Armory Gymnasium.

None of that however, mattered to the un-ranked Argos, as UGF spanked the Lights 23-13 in the first of two meetings between the teams this season. The rematch will come in February in Great Falls.

"Win, lose, or draw, what matters most to me is how we wrestle," Northern head coach Tyson Thivierge said. "Tonight, we didn't wrestle well. We didn't listen, we didn't trust our conditioning, and we wrestled with no confidence whatsoever. And UGF took it to us. They were the aggressor, from the very start, they took it to us, and we never responded to that."

The start was rough for the Lights as they sent out three freshmen, where the more experienced Argos took a big lead right off the bat when Isaac Wilson earned a technical fall over Rob Pair at 125 pounds. The win was the first of three straight for the Argos, with Clinton Garvin winning at 133 and Justin Whitman winning at 141 to help UGF build an 11-0 lead.

And while the Argos were clearly tough at the top of their lineup, whereas Northern lacked experience, especially with top-ranked Matt Weber (141) still out with an injury, Thivierge wasn't excusing any of it.

"Everybody has a job to do, and that's to go out and give it everything they've got," Thivierge said. "A lot of them didn't do their job tonight."

In the middle of the dual however, the Lights did battle back. If only briefly.

At 149 pounds, sophomore Drake Randall broke a 2-2 tie with Casey Dobson in the third period, and wound up winning a 5-2 decision. That was followed by a strong showing from senior Tommy Cooper, who scored four takedowns on Arram Price in the final four minutes to win 12-5. The two decisions brought Northern back to within striking distance at 11-6, with the biggest match of the night on deck.

The 165-pound showdown between sixth-ranked Andrew Bartel of Northern, and seventh-ranked Khaldoon Rashid, was a big one for both teams, and the two waged an epic battle. With an early takedown, Rashid led 2-1, but Bartel kept pace with a takedown of his own in the second period. Bartel earned an escape and forced a stalling call on Rashid to even things up at 6-6 in the waning seconds of the third period, but Rashid had a slight edge in riding time, and held on for a 7-6 win.

Rashid's victory turned the tide back in the Argos' favor, and in the next two matches, UGF's Randy Keesler and Sam Voigtlaender salted the dual away with dominant wins.

"The win by Khaldoon was a real swing match," UGF head coach Caleb Schaeffer said. "He did a great job."

Northern did win the final two matches of the night, with Ben Stroh moving up to 197 pounds, and outlasting standout UGF freshman John Hensely, 1-0, while Taylor Kornoely scored a major decision win over Matt Hopkins in the heavyweight bout. But it wasn't nearly enough, and after the dual Thivierge was in no mood to excuse how his team performed.

"They (Argos) made us look like a JV team tonight," Thivierge said. "I'm not going to sugarcoat it for anyone. We wrestled very, very badly. So, these guys are going to have to figure some things out, or it could end up being a long season."

The Lights will get an opportunity to turn things around in just a day's time. On Friday night, Northern will host Eastern Oregon inside the Armory Gymnasium. The Mounties are a first-year NAIA program, and their head coach is a former Northern All-American and Thivierge assistant Dustyn Azure. The Lights and Mounties will square off at 7 p.m.