Lights face off in Maroon/Gold Dual

Through the Montana State University-Northern wrestling team begins its season next week, there is still plenty of preparation before then. On Wednesday night at Armory Gymnasium, the Lights held their Maroon/Gold Dual which saw MSU-N wrestlers competing against one another.

The winners of the matches throughout the dual would win their spot on the Lights' starting lineup this season. MSU-N head coach Tyson Thivierge was unable to make the dual so MSU-N assistant coach Landon Bailey had to evaluate how the wrestlers performed and was pleased with what he saw.

"(We looked) pretty good. We got some young competitive kids," Bailey said. "We got a few things to work on, but other than that we're starting to look pretty good early in the season."

The night started off with an exhibition match between redshirt freshman Connor Harris and freshman Colin Silverthorn which Harris won 9-2. The Maroon/Gold Dual then had a match between redshirt freshman Martin Wilkie and freshman Kaleb Sanchez who wrestled at 141 pounds. Wilkie won the match with a technical fall in the second period to give the Maroon team a 6-0 lead in the dual.

Redshirt freshman Georgino Moraga and freshman Colby Schiever then wrestled at 149 pounds. Schreiver won the match, 9-5, to get the Gold team on the scoreboard and make it 5-3. Senior Chase Short and redshirt freshman Devin Crawford then wrestled at 165 pounds which Short won, 8-3, to extend the Maroon team's lead to 8-3.

Freshman Rylin Burns and redshirt sophomore NaKoda Siegel wrestled each other at 174 pounds. Siegel emerged victorious with the 7-3 win to cut the Maroon team's lead to 8-6. Wrestling at 184 pounds, redshirt sophomores Carl Hansen and Ethan Roetman then faced off. In a tight match, Hansen emerged with the 4-2 victory to extend the Maroon team's lead to 11-6.

In the final match of the night, redshirt junior Travis Adams and redshirt senior Rylan Moldenhauer wrestled at 285 pounds. With the match tied 2-2 at the end of the three periods, the match went to overtime. It took another four periods until Moldenhauer finished it with a 4-2 victory. However, it was not enough as the Maroon team won the dual, 11-9.

With the dual now over, the Lights now have their starting lineup of Wilkie, Schriever, Short, Siegel, Hansen and Moldenhauer. With their first dual coming next week, Bailey believes the Lights have the strong roster to start the season.

"We got some tough kids. We got tough returners and overall we're just starting to look a lot better as a team this year," Bailey said.

The Lights will head to Coeur D'Alene, Idaho, to wrestle against North Idaho College to start the season Oct. 29.