With seven state qualifiers back from last season, expectations are high for Oakland Mills wrestling.
Behind an 8-0 record from returning state champion and 195-pound senior Jaron Smith, the host Scorpions went 6-2 at the Scorpion Duals that featured several teams that are expected to compete for postseason accomplishments.
Wilde Lake, which is in a rebuilding stage, went 1-7 but earned precious mat-time for their young wrestlers early in the season.
"I love the team," said Oakland Mills coach Brad Howell. "They really progressed through the tournament. Thinking about some of the quality teams we got to wrestle, I'm pretty happy with the performance. But we got some growing to do."
The Scorpions started off Friday night with a 56-12 win over Dulaney, but lost by a point in a back and forth high scoring matchup to North Point, 40-39.
"This happens every year for us. There's one match, and I like to get the bug out early, that we're going to give up some pins," Howell said. "We had three matches where we were winning and we got pinned. ... I think we need to learn how to close out matches and have the urgency to get off your back."
The Scorpions also fell to a tough Middletown squad, 41-26, Saturday morning before bouncing back to beat Walkersville 80-0 and overcoming an early 12-0 deficit to beat La Plata 51-24. La Plata beat Middletown earlier in the day.
"Middletown is a great team," Howell said. "We wanted to get a good look at them and they're somebody we will see later in the year hopefully."
Few teams wrestle in tournaments on the first weekend of the season, but Howell said he likes his team to get the mat-time early so they can get conditioned for the long season ahead.
"That's the (best) part of this tournament, you get the bugs out early," he said. "We weren't harping on the wins and losses too much. I think they got more comfortable as the day went on."
Kyle Farace (113), Julian Capino (126), Dakota Thompson (138), Matthew Claxton (152) and Sidique Furet (170) went 7-1 for Oakland Mills.
As for the Wildecats, first-year coach Nick Sylor said it was a frustrating two days, but he was excited his young team got eight matches early in the season to improve.
"We got a young team and the competition was stiff, so it was a little frustrating," Sylor said. "Guys had their heads up and we'll be back in the room working hard on Monday."
Eddie Fermin was a bright spot for Wilde Lake as he finished the tournament 8-0 at 160 pounds.
Oakland Mills 56, Dulaney 12
North Point 40, Oakland Mills 39
Oakland Mills 80, St. Charles 0
Middletown 41, Oakland Mills 26
Oakland Mills 80, Walkersville 0
Oakland Mills 51, La Plata 24
Oakland Mills 58, Calvert 21
Oakland Mills 70, Blake 8
Reservoir opened its season with a 56-15 win over Northeast. Reservoir earned seven forfeits, and coach Andy McIntyre was happy with how his team wrestled against a team with some tough guys.
"We wrestled tough against Northeast's tough kids," he said. "They are a well coached team, and we have a better idea of where we stand going forward. It's a long season, but I think we are going to keep improving all year to get where we need to be."
Reservoir 56, Northeast 15
106 – Reese Kilcarr (Re) fft
113 – double forfeit
120 – Kleinhen (Re) fft
126 – K. Preston (NE) pinned Hayoung Park (Re) 5:12
132 – Troy Kilcarr (Re) tech fall Branch (NE) 3:30
138 – Trent Kilcarr (Re) fft
145 – Johnny Folea (Re) fft
152 – A. Lecorchick (NE) dec. Todd Del Tufo (Re) 2-0
160 – Jeremiah Branch (Re) fft
170 – Matt Gonales (Re) fft
182 – Stephen Sims (Re) dec W. Preston (NE) 3-2
195 – Shawn Hamilton (Re) pinned A. Delauser (NE) 4:32
220 – Tyler Ecker (Re) pinned T. Dunleavy (NE) 1:03
285 – A. Halbon NE fft.