Wow, what a weekend! The ASIJ Mustangs beat the St. Mary's Titans for the first time in a decade and went to tiebreaker criteria to determine a barn burner vs the Edgren Eagles en route to a 3rd place finish at the Zama dual meet tournament on Saturday. The tournament featured two pools of four teams each in a round-robin series of dual meets against the other three teams in the pool. The top teams from each pool were then paired against each other for 1st, the 2nd place pool teams paired against each other for 3rd, 3rd place pool teams for 5th, and 4th place pool teams for 7th. ASIJ was in Pool B with Matthew C. Perry, who had marched up from the Marine Corps base in Iwakuni, the Robert D. Edgren Eagles, who soared down from Misawa Air Base, and the Christian Academy of Japan Knights, who jousted across town to join the fray. The Mustangs left MC Perry looking for a few good men, taking 10 out of 13 weight classes to kick off pool play. Kyle and Katsumi won max points without a fight and Take pinned his opponent in 1:23 without allowing a point. Ira went up 6-1 before the upset bug (aka loss of endurance) struck and he fell 17-6 for an ASIJ lead of 15-4 that was never relinquished. ASIJ went on another run of seven straight from 129 to 180 before giving up a pin at 215 and forfeit at heavyweight. Michiru and Egan pinned their opponents in the first period, Masa and Ricky took forfeits, and Rin, Kieran and Zenon racked up a combined 30-0 for three straight technical falls. Dani went up 5-0 before getting caught in a 4-point takedown that led to a pin. MC Perry's heavyweight got a forfeit to get them into respectable double digit territory in the 47-14 ASIJ win. CAJ skewered the Mustangs a couple years ago, but the tables have clearly turned as ASIJ gnashed the knights 54-5 in the second round of pool play. Besides freshman Katsumi's loss vs an experienced senior at 108 and an Michiru's finish-in-a-flash tech fall for 4 points at 129, the Mustangs muscled the max five team points at every weight class from 101 to 215, with HWT going uncontested. Despite taking just 1:13 for Ira to pin his opponent, that was still more than the combined time that Take and Ricky took to get their pins at 24 and 26 seconds, respectively. The third round against Edgren was filled with excitement as the dual meet featured several lead changes and ended in a tie at 30-30. The tiebreakers went against ASIJ for the first non-conference dual meet loss of the season. Kyle took a forfeit at 101 to stake ASIJ out to a 5-0 lead. Katsumi got thrown and pinned at 108 to even it out at 5-5. Take breezed to a 10-0 tech fall victory and Ira got the pin to put ASIJ up 14-5. Edgren got two pins in a row over Michiru and Ricky at 129 and 135 to claim a 15-14 advantage. Egan got an awesome pin at 141 for a crucial 5 points. Rin had a strange phantom point awarded to both him and his opponent on the way to a 11-1 win at 148 for 4 team points. Kieran had all he could handle at 158 but pulled out a gutsy and smart 8-2 decision for another 3 points. Zenon's opponent wouldn't go down easily, but he still beat him 10-0 to put ASIJ up 30-15. The upper three weights saw the Eagles claw their way back to a 30-30 tie. Masa went up early before getting put on his back for a pin with four seconds left in the period at 180. Dani's opponent looked like someone skewed the aspect ratio of his picture by stretching it out sidewise and, despite a valiant effort that included a score, the match ended in a pin. With ASIJ's forfeit at HWT, Edgren got another 5 to even the team score. In the end, ASIJ had taken 7 of 13 weight classes, but because Edgren had six pins or forfeits to three for the Mustangs, the win went to Edgren, putting ASIJ at #2 in Pool B. The silver lining is that St. Mary's ended as the #2 team in Pool A, so the Edgren dual meet loss actually provided the opportunity for a rematch of the league dual meet vs the Titans. This time the Mustangs would leave nothing to chance. After providing ASIJ with the max 15 team points in the first three dual meets, Kyle met his nemesis, going head to head for a while before succumbing via tech fall at 101. Katsumi quickly righted the ship by taking a forfeit at 108 to kick of a scoring spree by ASIJ. Take took down the Titan he faced at 115, and did it again on his way to a tech fall win. Ira picked up a forfeit at 122 (I wouldn't have wanted to go against Ira either considering the outcome the last time they faced off). Michiru rounded out ASIJ's run of victories by wrestling the best match I've seen all season. A couple years ago Shota dug down deep to score for the win in a lionhearted match against a same-level opponent at the Yokota tournament that left both of them crumpled in heap from their efforts. Last year Zenon was fearless and disciplined in a 6-4 decision over the newly crowned Far East champion, who had won all three of their previous meetings that season. These are the type of matches that are etched into your mind forever as examples of the pinnacle of human effort and triumph in untenable circumstances. The 11-7 score and 3 team points for ASIJ don't come close to telling the story of the match that left both wrestlers an empty husk, their physical bodies collapsed on the ground after barely being able to shake hands and walk off the mat. It was truly something to behold. Unfortunately, that was followed by Ricky getting unceremoniously tech'ed at 135 and Egan getting pinned at 141 to pull St. Mary's within 17-13. Rin gave the Mustangs some breathing room with a now-standard Rin-style tech at 148. The Titans returned the favor at 158 but, knowing they needed the extra point the team gets from a pin for a chance at the win, kept the match going. Kieran did not allow a pin and instead scored on his opponent as the time wound down to zero to keep the Mustangs ahead 21-17. Zenon's opponent put up his best match of the season but still couldn't manage a victory against the undefeated senior captain, losing 4-3 and putting ASIJ up 24-17. Masa and Dani slammed the door on any hope of a comeback with a pin over an improving opponent and a forfeit, respectively, to lead to a final 34-17 score and 3rd place at the tournament. ASIJ wrestlers went 6-4 in exhibition matches with some nice wrestling throughout the day. Leila continues to set the pace for the JV wrestlers as she secured two takedowns on the way to a pin of MC Perry before getting pinned by Kinnick. Kai H split his two matches, losing by pin after a huge takedown of Edgren followed by a 13-0 tech fall win over CAJ, featuring two more 4-point takedowns to put him within striking distance of Leila for the most JV takedowns. As the biggest freshman on the team, Shawn won his lone match by pin against Kinnick to keep atop the JV leaderboard with Leila. Several part or full-time varsity wrestlers got some exhibition matches in as well. Josh kept it close at 6-4 before losing steam and falling 14-4 to Kinnick. Reuben went up 2-0 before giving up a big move and the pin to SMIS. Liam had an "I'm back!" performance with a 10-0 dismantling of Kinnick. Zenon provided an opportunity for his SMIS opponent to go against the best but didn't allow him to do anything in his 10-0 win. Dani got the pin in under a minute against Yokota; he'll be a monster on varsity when he transfers his JV success (3-0) to the big leagues. It's hard to tell when a trend has started. Is the housing market taking off, or are this month's numbers just a blip due to a one-time factor? Is there a major shift in the electorate, or is the latest election an anomaly that is counter to the basic fundamentals, which remain unchanged? You hear experts debate those types of questions all the time. Here's one to think about: Are the Mustangs for real? Is ASIJ becoming the team to beat in the Kanto Plain conference...and in the entire Far East? Consider the following indicators: The first Mustangs win over St. Mary's in probably a decade. ASIJ winning a majority of the weight classes in all four dual meets against respectable and heretofore dominant opponents. Memorable individual efforts that combine heart with brains. These form an unmistakable trend that - if the team continues to improve - can ensconce ASIJ as the King of the Hill.
The next chance for the Mustangs to solidify the trend towards paramountcy comes in a dual meet against Kinnick, who's sailing up from the Navy base at Yokosuka on Tuesday. The winner will be 4-1 in the regular season and secure 2nd place in the Kanto Plain Association of Secondary Schools standings for the 2018-19 season. That would be a major turnaround from the 1-4, 5th place finish two years ago. It will also be seniors night, and the last chance to see the Mustangs at ASIJ this season.
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