River Hill leads Howard County wrestling tournament after Day 1

With Day 1 of the Howard County wrestling tournament in the books, it's host River Hill that holds a 9.5 point lead over the county dual and 1A/2A dual state champions Oakland Mills on Friday.

The Hawks earned 85.5 points through the championship and consolation quarterfinal rounds, while the Scorpions have 76. Marriotts Ridge (65 points), Glenelg (58) and Reservoir (48) round out the top-five.

Oakland Mills coach Brad Howell isn't worried about being in second place, and knows his team's work will speak for itself after the tournament is finished.

"We looked great today. We put 11 in the semis," Howell said. "Some of those points come down to our guys getting byes into the semis. We have five weight classes where we haven't scored a point yet because they haven't wrestled a match yet. We'll come back from that. What I saw from my guys was some pretty good wrestling today."

For River Hill, coach Brandon Lauer was hoping for 10 wrestlers in the semifinals, but ended up with eight. Still, he knows his team got the job done getting much-needed bonus points in the early rounds.

"We got a lot of pins early, and that's probably why we ended up getting that 9.5 point lead," Lauer said. "This is a grind. You got to wrestle hard, not just in the semis. Those guys that fall short in the semis need to come back and wrestle hard and place as high as they can. That's the name of the game, and obviously head-to-head matches (with Oakland Mills) will be critical."

Individually, there were few surprises in the brackets.

At 132-pounds, Glenelg's No. 3 seed Garrett Murray fell to Marriotts Ridge No. 6 seed Will Parks by pin, and Reservoir's No. 6 seed Todd Del Tufo upset Marriotts Ridge No. 3 seed Zack Moody 6-3 at 138-pounds.

Besides those two bouts, every No. 1 and 2 seed advanced to the semifinals, while 12 No. 3 seeds reached the final-four. The semifinals are scheduled for 8:30 a.m.

Here are the semifinal matchups:

106: Spano (MR) vs. Farace (OM); Kleinhen (Re) vs. Shealy (RH)

113: Hampton (A) vs. Neilon (C); Hejeebu (MR) vs. Rynn (OM)

120: Thompson (OM) vs. Potts (RH); Silk (G) vs. Kassiri (Ho)

126: Troy Kilcarr (Re) vs. Habibi (MR); Williams (Ho) vs. Jeff Hayden (MH)

132: Jimmy Hayden (MH) vs. Gatewood (OM); Parks (MR) vs. Trent Kilcarr (Re)

138: Griffie (G) vs. Johnson (MH); Del Tufo (Re) vs. Bond (RH)

145: Claxton (OM) vs. Crumback (Ho); Erskine (RH) vs. Budock (G)

152: Kraisser (C) vs. Deitemyer (MR); Sotka (G) vs. Asifo (OM)

160: Guthier (RH) vs. Gilbert (LR); Fermin (WL) vs. Jones (A)

170: Furet (OM) vs. Conolly (RH); Sims (Re) vs. Murphy (MH)

182: Smith (OM) vs. Massey (Ho); Switlick (MR) vs. Daniel (RH)

195: Hamilton (Re) vs. Tinsley (OM); Day (MH) vs. Wysocki (C)

220: Kirby (RH) vs. Desautelle (MR); Vincent (OM) vs. Twigg (G)

285: Jeremy Nelson (Ha) vs. Maleta (Re); Cooch (G) vs. Rozier (OM)

Team scores entering semifinals: