Akeo wins title at first Central wrestling competition
STEVENS POINT, WIS. — In the first bracketed tournament for the Central College wrestling team since the 2019-20 season, Shandon Akeo (senior, Honolulu, Hawaii, Kapolei HS) was the 125-pound champion at the Pointer Open Saturday.
In addition to Akeo’s title, Central had eight other wrestlers finish in the top six of their weight classes at the 14-team tournament hosted by the University of Wisconsin – Stevens Point. No team scores were kept.
“It’s been two years since we’ve had a regular tournament like today,” coach Eric Van Kley said. “The team and the staff were really excited to get going again.”
Akeo went 4-0, winning twice by fall and taking an 11-9 decision over Julian Valtierrez (North Central College [Ill.]) in the final.
“He’s become one of the leaders of our program,” Van Kley said. “He put in a tremendous amount of work in the offseason and it showed today. It was a really solid tournament overall.”
A 5-1 day for Duncan Delzell (sophomore, 141 pounds, Burlington) yielded a third-place finish, picking up a pair of pins.
“Duncan really stepped up and wrestled some hard-nosed matches,” Van Kley said.
The freshmen trio of Cael Cox (133 pounds, Ankeny), Rheiner Stahlbaum (125 pounds, Johnston) and Colby Tool (157 pounds, Reasnor, PCM HS) all placed in their first Central competition. Cox was 4th at 133 pounds, Stahlbaum was 5th at 125 and Tool was 6th at 157.
“I was proud of them,” “First time in the collegiate environment, they had some good days.”
Other place-winners include Samuel Zook (senior, 285 pounds, Oak Harbor, Wash), Rob Areyano (senior, 149 pounds, Selma, Calif.), Miles Berg (sophomore, 197 pounds, Indianola) and Luke Condy (junior, 157 pounds, Memphis, Tenn., Christian Brothers). Zook was fourth and the other three finished fifth in their respective weight classes.
Central is at the Millikin Open in Decatur, Illinois next Saturday.
“There’s a lot of things we need to improve on and we’ve got to continue to get tougher as a team,” Van Kley said. “But I thought we improved as the day went on and it was a good start to the season.”
