Men's Wrestling | 2/19/2015 10:40:00 PM

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Kelly Garrigus, Graduate Assistant to the Sports Information Director, 630-637-5302

(Feb. 19, 2015) – The North Central College wrestling team finished third at the 2015 College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) with sophomore Layten Binion and senior Dylan Mahler taking first place in the 141-pound and 285-pound classes. 

Binion, having won the 133-pound class last year, took yet another championship home by winning at 141. Binion approached the first match aggressively and it showed in the results with a quick pin at 2:00 against Jeremiah Brown of Wheaton College. The next match proved to be no different with Binion dominating Matt Quigley of Elmhurst College in a 14-5 major decision to take first-place. 

Mahler also showed determination today by grabbing the championship at 285. In the first match against Tad Haugen of Wheaton, Mahler won with an 11-4 decision that put him against the two-seed Jack Seaman of Augustana. Mahler continued his impressive season by eventually taking down Seaman in a 4-3 decision. 

At 125, Brandon Malone was the first surprise of the day by making it to the championship round as the No. 3-seed. He took the first match against second-seeded Carlos Fuentez of Wheaton with a 7-4 decision. Malone would face up against the top-seeded, Jimmy Panozzo of Augustana College but would lose in a 7-0 decision. 

Casey McWhirter (133) continued his success to finish the season by placing second. McWhirter started off against Carter Beebe of Elmhurst and found a tough matchup but won with a 8-5 decision. This win placed McWhirter up against top-seeded Brendan Gould of Augustana in the first-place match. Gould won handily with a 10-1 major decision. 

Erick Kirkman (165) helped the Cardinals by making it to the championship match against top-seeded Stephen Aiello of Wheaton. Kirkman proved to be a tough matchup but lost to Aiello in a 10-3 decision. 

Nathan Segal (149), Blake Olson (157) and Javier Ishola-Marquez (184) all would place third for the Cardinals. Segal matched up against Matt Sears of Augustana in the third-place round and won in a close 4-2 decision. Olson was pinned at 4:00 in the first round against Jared Fekete of Wheaton but went on to take third place against Nick Dinardo in a 7-5 decision. 

Ishola-Marquez had to face off against Outstanding Wrestler of the tournament, Dan Olsen of Wheaton, in the first round. Olsen took the match with an 8-2 decision but Ishola-Marquez went on to defeat Bobby Schillinger of Elmhurst in a 4-3 decision to take third-place. 

Wheaton College edged out last year's champion Augustana by accounting for 79.5 points. Augustana took second with 70 points, North Central was third with 65 points and Elmhurst was last with 53 points. Outstanding Wrestler of the tournament was Dan Olsen of Wheaton and the Coach of the Year Award went to Jim Gruenwald of Wheaton. 

The Cardinals' next competition will be the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division III Midwest Region Championships being held in Crawfordsville, Ind. All results and video can be found at northcentralcardinals.com