BY WENDI REARDON PRICE
Clarkston News Sports Writer
Senior Jacob Jones and junior Ashton Anderson hit a career milestone on the wrestling mats as they each won their 100th match, Jan. 22, against Oxford.
Jones moved up a weight class to post a fall over Austin Penzien in the 285-pound weight class for his milestone.
“He is one of those kids who is fun to watch wrestle,” said Joe Wood, head coach for Clarkston Varsity Wrestling. “He doesn’t wrestle like a big guy even though he wrestles the big kids. It’s really nice when you can count on seniors like Jacob and say ‘hey, Jake you are going to go up a weight class and we need you to pin him.’ And Jake says ‘I am going to pin him, coach.’ Then, he goes out and does it.”
Anderson (130) won his match over Darren Mcleod in a 4-0 decision to mark his 100th victory.
“Ashton is only a junior so it speaks to his ability,” said Wood “He’s great and he is one of the kids we lean on for our team. We are really excited to have him step on the mat.”
The Wolves won their OAA Red dual over Oxford, 42-13.

“We drew this up a couple different ways and we thought it would be closer,” Wood said. “They are a good team. They are well-coached. They’ve come on strong late in the season. We were being conservative. We have had a great season, don’t get me wrong, but they are tough. There is a lot of mutual respect between our two programs so we just drew it up and thought it would be a tight one. Some matches were tight, I don’t think the score indicated the tightness of the duels because we won a few one point matches and overtime match. We are really proud of our guys and the way they wrestled.”
The Wolves opened the night with Connor Ulrich setting the pace in the 145-pound weight class, controlling the entire match. He finished the first period against Liam Hamilton with a 2-0 lead. Then, added two points for a reversal and another two points for a near fall to finish the second period, 6-0. Ulrich finished the match 6-1.
Grady Castle (152) pinned Sal Vackaro within 27 seconds of the match to add six points to Clarkston’s score. Dru Martin (103) had the third pin of the night with a fall 26 seconds into the third period over Zach Call.
Auggie Anderson won the 112-pound weight class over Lukas Smith with a technical fall, one minute left in the match, 21-6.
Drew Stark (215) won by major decision over Hunter Drake, 12-2. Hayden Payne (160) and Collin Trevino (189) added three points each to the Wolves’ score, winning their matches.
Payne won by a 15-8 decision over Tate Myer and Trevino won 6-4 in overtime against Ty Myre.
“I am just proud of these kids,” said Wood. “Expectations coming into this year, we just didn’t know all the pieces and how the pieces would fit. Thirteen dual meets later, it’s going pretty good. It talks to the kids wanting. The kids who graduated last year have set a bar. They were the first team in 11 years to make it to the team quarterfinals. These kids all saw it and wanted to be a part of it. They want to enjoy it. They took it upon themselves.”
He added the wrestlers still have a lot of work to do, but the win over Oxford was good.
Clarkston competed on Saturday in the Beast of the East Richmond Invitational where they lost to host, Richmond, 37-29.
They won their meet over Romeo, winning eight matches, 40-31. The Wolves won four matches by falls which was Martin over Drake Garrisi, 1:27; Ulrich over Marcus Donovan, 4:40; Grady Castle over Carson Kohl, 2:40; and Jones (215) over Alex Lukowski, 3:31.
Four wins also came from Presley Pearce (140) over Christian Robbins, 9-1; Payne over Corey Allison, 5-0; Ashton Anderson over James Rivers, 5-2; Trevino (171) by void.
The Wolves host Detroit Catholic Central and Crestwood on Wednesday.

  Clarkston Varsity Wrestling