at the National Junior/Senior Wrestling Championships in Fredricton and a couple came home with medals around their necks.
Two former Cochrane Cowboys Wrestling Club members, Callum McNeice (University of Calgary) and Aidan McKeage (University of Alberta) put on a solid showing, both winning one match and losing two in the Olympic style category.
“We didn’t win any weight classes, but we wrestled well. It was a learning experience,” said Cowboys head coach Vern McNeice. “It’s a different level of competition. When you’re competing at high school level, there are still kids that are introductory wrestlers and they’re not as strong.
“At nationals, everyone there is a national champion, medallist, or team member.”
McNeice’s youngest son, 16-year-old Connor (St. Timothy High School), is a national champion at the cadet level, who won his first match against a national champion, but then lost his second match against a wrestler from Ontario due to controversy.
The match was dead even, with 6.5 seconds remaining, when Connor was mistakenly penalized for a caution point (avoiding to wrestle), costing him the match.
“You hate to sound like a complainer, but the call was not consistent with any of the previous ones called,” McNeice said.
“It bumped him out of the gold medal match, which was very disappointing, but in hindsight you look back and go, ‘it’s something he has to deal with, it wasn’t fair, but he had the opportunity to bury that match earlier and didn’t.’ That came back to haunt him. It was a good lesson.”
Obviously, the lesson paid off, considering Connor wrestled three more matches and walked away with a bronze medal.
“(Connor) did very well after that,” McNeice said.
“In one of the last matches, he beat a two-time national champion 17-5. It was great.”
As for the two Cowboys alumni competitors, McNeice’s older son, Callum, failed to medal, but McKeage managed to bag silver in the Greco category.
“In freestyle, they both came up a bit short, and were very disappointed,” McNeice said.
“But, they were in every match. At this level of competition, there’s a fine line between winning and losing. Aidan getting silver was a nice way for him to end the season though.”
Now, the Cowboys are preparing for the National Cadet/Juvenile Wrestling Championships, which are to be held at the University of Calgary’s Jack Simpson gym over the weekend of April 16 to 18.
Cowboys are expected to send around a dozen competitors.
“There will be 800 to 900 athletes from all over Canada competing,” McNeice said.
“We’ve got some kids in our program we’re very excited about. There’s at least half a dozen that can place top six or even medal and win their categories.
“It’s the pinnacle of our year.”
