Jared Torrence
The Northern Illinois University wrestling team opened the second half of their season on a positive note Saturday in Victor E. Court with an easy 33-15 victory over SIU Edwardsville.
In the five weights with a match, the Huskies (4-5, 0-2 MAC) earned victories over the Cougars (3-8, 1-0 SoCon) in four of them. Meanwhile, NIU took advantage of three SIUE forfeits to take the victory.
“The positives are that we won seven of the 10 bouts,” said NIU head coach Ryan Ludwig. “Whether there was a forfeit or not, it was nice to have some of those situations come back where we were able to wrestle exhibitions. For the guys that had matches today, they executed for the most part.”
“Those are things you can’t worry about. You control what’s in front of you and, if there’s an opponent in front of you, you wrestle and that’s what we did.”
Matt Mougin got the Huskies on the board in the first match of the day in a 4-1 decision against Jake Residori at 174 pounds. Following a first period takedown and a second period escape to build a 3-1 lead through two periods, the Huskie redshirt senior held off Residori’s reversal attempts to gain a 3-0 NIU lead.
SIUE, though, quickly knotted things up at 184 when Deshoun White scored a 3-1 win over Caleb Busson following a takedown with less than 10 seconds left in regulation. However, Shawn Scott gave the lead back to NIU with a 5-3 victory at 197 pounds against Chris Johnson.
Matt Mougin
Jared Torrence pushed the Huskie lead to 9-3 with an exciting 5-2 win over David Devine at 285. After Devine scored an escape early in the third period to tie the match at 1-1, Torrence came up with some last-second heroics with two takedowns in the last 30 seconds to clinch the victory.
Nick Harrison earned a win via forfeit at 125 to push the NIU advantage to 15-3 at the intermission.
SIUE scored forfeit wins at 133 and 141 to tie the dual at 15-15, but NIU retook the lead at 21-15 when they got a forfeit victory at 149.
Andrew Morse made quick work of Logun Taylor at 157 pounds with a first period pin after building up an 8-0 lead in the first two-and-a-half minutes. Shaun’Qae McMurtry concluded the match with a forfeit win at 165.
The Huskies hit the road next weekend with a Mid-American Conference tilt at Ohio. The dual against the Bobcats starts at 6 p.m. CT inside the Ohio Convocation Center.
NIU 33, SIU Edwardsville 15
174: Matt Mougin (NIU) dec. Jake Residori (SIUE), 4-1
184: Deshoun White (SIUE) dec. Caleb Busson (NIU), 3-1
197: Shawn Scott (NIU) dec. Chris Johnson (SIUE), 5-3
285: Jared Torrence (NIU) dec. David Devine (SIUE), 5-2
125: Nick Harrison (NIU) wins by forfeit
133: Patrick Myers (SIUE) wins by forfeit
141: Drew Vrbenec (SIUE) wins by forfeit
149: Rob Jillard (NIU) wins by forfeit
157: Andrew Morse (NIU) pins Logun Taylor (SIUE), 2:47
165: Shaun’Qae McMurtry (NIU) wins by forfeit
For more information on NIU wrestling and Huskie athletics, visit www.niuhuskies.com.
