Duke Wrestlers Pick Up Eight Wins At Southern Scuffle, Finish 26th

Friday, December 29

Greensboro, N.C.

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Southern Scuffle

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Duke Wrestlers Pick Up Eight Wins At Southern Scuffle, Finish 26th

1/1/2007 12:00:00 AM | Wrestling

By: Duke Sports Information

GREENSBORO, N.C. ? 14 Blue Devils competed in the Southern Scuffle Tournament at the Greensboro Coliseum Complex on Dec. 29. Duke placed 26th out of 32 teams, with Missouri edging out Minnesota for the tournament title. Picking up wins were junior Kellan McKeon (two), junior Wes Kuser (two), freshmen Voris Tejada (one), senior Daniel Shvartsman (one), freshman Jared Sernoffsky (one), and redshirt freshman John Barone (one).

At 125 pounds, McKeon won 6-2 over Appalachian State's Frank Celorrio, before losing 10-4 in the preliminaries to Javie Maldonado of Tennessee-Chattanooga. McKeon bounced back in the wrestlebacks with an 18-5 thumping of Stephen Gambino from East Stroudsburg, and then dropped a closely contested match 9-7 to Eric Morrill of Edinboro.
Kuser picked up two victories at 141 pounds, including a pin at 5:09 of his match with Lehigh's Nate Spangler. Kuser then lost a tight match to Missouri's Marcus Hoehn by a score of 6-4. His other win came in the wrestlebacks with a 16-0 technical fall that came at 3:09 of his bout with Jeremy Depoy of Kent State.

Tejada and Shvartsman both notched one win each at 149 pounds. Tejada defeated Chris Cartella of George Mason in his first contest 1-0, and Shvartsman won his first match 4-3 over Trevor Chinn of Lehigh. For Tejada it was his team-high 17th win of the season.

Duke's other two victories came from Sernoffsky at 157 pounds and Barone at 174 pounds. Sernoffsky pinned Gardner-Webb's David Pelsang at 3:26, and Barone defeated Antoine Love of Ohio University by a score of 15-10. Barone improved his team-best record to 13-5.

The tournament would not see any Blue Devils compete in its second day on Dec. 30, but this was not due to a lack of effort or success by the Duke wrestlers. The other eight wrestlers who competed for Duke were senior Philip Wightman (141 pounds), sophomore Addison Nuding (157 pounds), freshman Mathew Koelling (165 pounds), redshirt sophomore Aaron Glover (165 pounds), redshirt sophomore Dan Tulley (184 pounds), redshirt sophomore Dan Fox (184 pounds), redshirt junior Patrick Keenum (197 pounds), and redshirt freshman Mike Tunick (285 pounds). Glover and Fox had especially tough draws, as Glover was pinned in his first match by eventual second-place finisher Steve Anceravage of Cornell, and Fox lost 12-4 to third-place winner Alex Clemsen of Edinboro.

Duke is now through the tournament portion of its season, and will compete in head-to-head team matchups throughout the next two months. The Blue Devils next meet will be at home with both Princeton and Davidson on January 6 in Cameron Indoor Stadium at 6 p.m. It is the first home match of the season for Duke, and will also feature the first annual Duke Wrestling Reunion.

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