COLLEGEVILLE, Minn. — The Cobber Big Boys opened the month of February by posting three top 3 finishes at the North Country Invite hosted by St. John’s on Saturday.
Heavyweights Tom Bouressa and Cody Kasprick finished second and third at 285 and senior All-American Nathan Schmitz continued his recovery tour by placing third at 197.
No.7-ranked Bouressa won his first four matches of the day before falling in the championship match to Michael Kroells from the University of Minnesota. Kroells is currently 23-6 on the year for the Division I Gophers. Bouressa started the day by pinning Dan Lovik of MSU Mankato in 2:20. He then went on to post decisions over Zach Petersen of Ridgewater CC, Gabe Tudor and Austin Goergen of St. Cloud State.
With the four wins on the day, Bouressa ups his season record to 19-3.
Kasprick was the team’s iron man of the day. He ended up wrestling in eight matches and posted an amazing seven victories. He lost his second match of the day in a hard-fought 2-1 decision against Caleb White from St. Cloud State and then went on to record six straight victories in the wrestlebacks. He started his comeback streak by pinning Austin Johnson of St. John’s in a mere 1:21. He then had a pin fall against Zack Gibson of St. Olaf before getting a 5-4 decision over John Scepaniak of St. John’s, a 4-1 decision over White to avenge his loss in the round of 16 and then a 9-8 decision over Goergen to advance to the third-place match. Kasprick claimed a pin at 2:21 of the third-place bout over Brian Klevis of Dickinson State.
Kasprick is now 18-11 on the year. He is now one win away from his total from last year when he went 19-13.
Schmitz continues to try and get back to his All-American form of last year after suffering a severe injury earlier in the season. He went 4-1 for the meet and is now 9-3 since returning to the lineup in the middle of January. Schmitz scored wins over Ryan Williamson of St. Olaf and Luke Belich from St. Cloud State and had two wins over Kevin Keisler from Dickinso State.
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Other top Cobber performers at the North Country Invite included Kyle LeDuc, Josten Coleman and Brandon Haluptzok at 165 and Sebastian Gardner . LeDuc was 4-2 and finished in fourth place at 157. Both of his losses came at the hands of Brad Dolezal from the University of Minnesota. Dolezal entered the meet 16-9 and won the NDSU Bison Open earlier in the year. Coleman and Haluptzok split third-place honors at 165. Coleman was 5-1 before the third-place match with teammate Haluptzok while Haluptzok was 4-1. With the four wins, Coleman becomes the first CC wrestler to reach the 20-win mark for the year. He is now 20-8. Gardner went 5-2 at 174 and is now 12-7 on the season.
North Country Open Results
The Cobbers will finish off the regular season with three dual matches. Concordia will start the trio of duals when they host cross town rival MSU Moorhead on Tuesday, Feb. 5 at 7 p.m.