28th Annual Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational
Bulls Finish in 23rd Place at 28th Annual Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational
12/4/2009 12:00:00 AM | Wrestling
PRIMM, NV - The University at Buffalo wrestling team finished in
23rd place among 42 teams at the 28th Annual Cliff Keen Las Vegas
Invitational at the Star of the Desert Arena. Over the two-day
event, seven Bulls recorded multiple victories in their respective
weight classes. The event concluded on Saturday with John-Martin Cannon recording the Bulls' top individual finish of seventh
place in the 165-pound weight class.
On Saturday, Cannon opened the day by dropping an 8-3 decision to
sixth nationally-ranked and 2009 NCAA All-American Andy Rendos of
Bucknell.
Following his loss to Rendos, Cannon found himself facing a
familiar opponent in the bout for seventh-place, 11th-seed Oscar
Huntley of Navy. In Cannon's string of opening upsets on
Friday, the sophomore dominated Huntley in a 9-3 decision. On
Saturday, the result was the same as Cannon once again dominated
the four-time Virginia state placewinner in an 11-5 decision to
record a seventh place-finish.
As the lone Bull competing on Saturday, Cannon had a very
impressive outing at this year's event. As an unseeded
competitor, the sophomore captured back-to-back opening victories
over seeded wrestlers on Friday. Cannon opened the day with one of
the best wins of his career as he defeated sixth-seed Eren Civan of
Columbia, 5-3. Civan captured second place at the 2009 New York
State Intercollegiate Championships in the 165-pound weight
class.
"John-Martin competed in a field of nearly 15 top-30
wrestlers in his weight class, finishing in seventh. He did a great
job for us," said head coach Jim Beichner.
As a team, Buffalo recorded its best finish since 2005. With seven
Buffalo wrestlers collecting multiple victories over the two-day
event, much could be said about each individual performance. On
Friday, the Bulls sent Cannon, Jimmy Hamel and Kevin Smith to the
quarterfinal bouts of their respective weight classes.
"We were a little disappointed with many of the results and
we think we could have done much better. We see a lot of hope when
we look at how many wins we had this year. As a team, we had a lot
of significant wins at a lot of different weight classes. There is
a lot of hope for our team. I think there are bigger and better
things in store for us as long as our wrestlers use this as good
experience to get us prepared for the rest of the season,"
said Beichner.
The Bulls (1-0-1, 0-0 MAC) return to dual action as they travel to
Pennsylvania on Sunday, December 13 to face host East Stroudsburg
and Drexel at 11:00 am.
