Ankeny wrestling coach Jack Wignall has a predicament on his hands.
The Hawks’ top two finishers in the Dan Gable Donnybrook on Friday and Saturday at Xtream Arena in Coralville were Ben Walsh and Isaac Wignall, who both competed at 106 pounds.
“It does create a dilemma,” said Wignall. “You have two kids that are that good at the same weight. At some point, one of them is going to have to go up. We need to have both of those kids in the lineup. It’s going to be interesting to see who ends up doing that.”
Walsh placed second for the Hawks, while Wignall finished third. They both went 4-1 in the tournament.
Walsh posted an 8-2 decision over Charles Barnhouse of Iowa City West in the opening round, then recorded three straight falls to reach the finals. He was then pinned by Hayden Schwab of Don Bosco in 4 minutes 31 seconds.
Wignall, meanwhile, advanced to the semifinals before dropping an 11-2 major decision to Schwab. He then bounced back to pin Carew Christensen of Waukee Northwest in 2:22 in the third-place match.
Both Walsh and Wignall rebounded after losing tough matches on Thursday in the Hawks’ dual-meet loss at Dowling Catholic in their season opener.
“These were much different and tougher circumstances,” Wignall said. “I thought they really performed well.”
Ankeny’s Truman Folkers and Ben Hansen also went 4-1 in the tournament. Folkers placed fifth at 126, while Hansen took ninth at 144.
Folkers dropped a 9-4 decision to Timothy Koester of Bettendorf in the quarterfinals. He then won his next two matches, capped off by a 3-1 overtime decision against Donny Pigoni of Marmion Academy of Aurora (Ill.).
After losing in the second round, Hansen reeled off three straight wins. He posted an 8-3 decision over Nick Korman of Albert Lea Area (Minn.) in the ninth-place match.
Teagen Peiffer placed 10th for the Hawks at 157. Jacob Schlee took 14th at 175, Andrew Rouh was 15th at 138, and Aiden Winkie at 126 and Kash Johnson at 150 both finished 22nd.
“I was really happy with how all the kids wrestled,” Wignall said. “We had some freshmen who we weren’t sure how they would respond, but holy smokes, they wrestled hard.”
Ankeny placed 14th in the 39-team field. The Hawks finished with 194 points.
Mt. Carmel of Chicago won the tournament with 401 points. Four of top five teams came from outside of Iowa.
“We knew it was going to be tough,” Wignall said. “When you bring in 39 teams, there’s bound to be some good kids somewhere–and there were. But we had a lot of fun.”
The Hawks will host a CIML Conference dual meet against Waukee on Thursday. The Warriors placed 33rd at the Donnybrook with 60 points.
“I’m excited to get a dual-meet win,” Wignall said. “That’s the plan.”
