3W Bismarck 28 1W Minot 26

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Third seed Bismarck High School reversed their regular season loss to top ranked Minot with a 28-26 victory in the State Dual semifinals Friday afternoon at the Fargodome.  The Demons won the match by two points in spite an 8-6 matches won differential in favor of the Magi.  The dual was a story of three runs, with Bismarck High starting fast and winning the first three matches of the dual starting at 113.  At 113, Bismarck High used 106 extra Preston Fettig, who defeated Minot 106 Kelby Armstrong by 9-0 major decision. From there, Bismarck got a 4-0 decision from Alex Kaseman over Sam Goodman at 120 and a fall from state champion Ryan Ripplinger at 126.  Ripplinger’s pin gave the Demons an early 13-0 lead.  Minot then went on to win the next six matches, but Head Coach Justin Racine’s squad was only able to grab bonus points at two weights.  that would prove to be the difference in the match, as Bismarck High gave up 3.25 points per loss, a ridiculous number in pin-heady North Dakota.  Bismarck was able to stop the bleeding with a pin from Justin Bergquist at 182, but Minot held the lead 20-19 with four matches to go.  At 195, Bismarck High was again able to stop Minot from gaining bonus when four seed Je-Mario Jones defeated Jared Rath 4-2.  220 featured a battled of two wrestlers that will compete in tonights semifinals, and Bismarck’s top ranked Chase Dockter defeated Hunter Swartwout 5-3 to cut the Magi lead back to one.  Though he didn’t get a victory, Bismarck’s Nolan Hintz did his job at 285, holding Minot’s third ranked Elijah Huff to a decision and giving top ranked 106  Demon Laken Boese the chance to score a walk-off dual victory with a technical fall or major decision.  Boese wasted little time getting the job done, pinning Rios to advance Bismarck to another state dual final.

Bismarck Century 42 Mandan 21

West #2 Century won nine of fourteen matches against West #4 Mandan to advance to their second straight state dual final.  The match began at 113, and in a matchup that we will see later this evening in the semifinals, Mandan #3 Will Kleinknecht started things off right for the Braves by scoring a convincing 7-2 victory over #2 Mason Schulz.  Schulz had previously beaten Keinknecht for the West Region championship a week ago.  From there, Century got to work, winning the next five matches-two by pin and one by technical fall, to take a 23-3 lead after six.  Most importantly, Century edged Mandan in two tossups. At 126, Izaiah Bitz defeated Eric Siplman 4-0, and at 132 Clint Coleman upended Kolton Reisenauer 3-2. Mandan was able to turn things around at 152 when Isaac Berger defeated Trey Pajimula 3-2, but Mandan would only win three matches the rest of the way against Century’s dominant upper weights.

The Patriots will be without 182 Cameron Rants for the remainder of the dual tournament as he was given a flagrant misconduct in the Mandan Dual.  Because they are separate entities, Rants will be allowed to continue with the individual end in this evening’s semifinal round.