No. 16 Wrestling Rebounds with 29-9 Defeat of Oregon State in Pac-10 Action
ASU wins seven of 10, including Patrick Pitsch’s upset victory, to remain perfect in conference
TEMPE, Ariz. – The No. 16 Arizona State University wrestling team rebounded from a pair of tough defeats by remaining perfect in the Pac-10 Conference with a 29-9 victory over host Oregon State Saturday afternoon in Corvallis, Ore. The Sun Devils (6-6-1, 3-0-0 Pac-10) picked up wins in seven of the 10 contested bouts to send the Beavers (9-6-1, 4-2-1) to their second conference loss in as many days.
The dual opened at 149 pounds with No. 10 Patrick Williams (Sr., Homestead, Fla.) returning from injury to win a 12-8 decision over Orlando Perez and stake the Sun Devils to a 3-0 lead. No. 14 Brian Stith (So., Hampton, Va.) added four team points to the visitors’ total as he recorded an 11-2 major decision over Tony Hook to push the advantage to 7-0.
In the first of three bouts decided by two points or less, Patrick Pitsch (Fr., Spanaway, Wash.) scored a 3-2 upset of No. 14 Matt Ellis to push ASU’s lead to 10-0. The deciding points came in the first period of action as Pitsch, whose brother wrestles for OSU, recorded a takedown almost two minutes into the bout while the remaining points for both competitors coming from escapes. The Beavers got on the board one bout later as Jeremy Larson scored a 10-3 decision over Rick Renzi (Fr., Flagstaff, Ariz.) at 174.
ASU took control of the dual for good as its wrestlers won each of the next four bouts. No. 11 C.B. Dollaway (Jr., Mt. Gilead, Ohio) started the winning streak with a pin of Dan Pitsch in 2:21. No. 7 Ryan Bader (Jr., Reno, Nev.) then pushed the Sun Devil advantage to 20-3 with his 12-2 major decision over Travis Gardner at 197.
Sun Devil big man No. 4 Cain Velasquez (Jr., Yuma, Ariz.) followed with a win of his own in the long battle of Top 20 competitors in the dual. Velasquez scored an 11-7 decision over No. 11 Ty Watterson, handing the OSU heavyweight his first loss in his last 11 bouts. The final individual victory of the dual came one bout later as No. 10 Jeremy Mendoza (Jr., Temecula, Calif.) pinned Eric Stevenson at 3:33 to bring the score to 29-3.
OSU won the last two bouts of the day as Bobby Pfennigs recorded a 4-2 decision over John Espinoza (So., Phoenix, Ariz.) at 133 before Tim Norman grabbed a 4-3 decision over Chris Frieje (Fr., Mesa, Ariz.) at 141.
The Sun Devils conclude their weekend road swing through the state of Oregon Sunday afternoon when they face the Oregon Ducks in a 2 p.m. contest in Eugene, Oregon
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