No. 18 OSU wrestlers escape with win
January 17, 1999
CORVALLIS, Ore. - Nathan Navarro's pin at 125 pounds keyed 18th-ranked Oregon State's 20-19 win over Oregon in Pacific-10 wrestling Saturday night at Gill Coliseum. OSU (9-4 overall, 3-1 Pacific-10) escaped with the win after Oregon (3-3, 2-3) led 16-4 at one point in the meet.
OSU took the win in front of a Beaver Wrestling Homecoming crowd of 2,219, Oregon State's biggest crowd for a home dual in the 1990s. Included in the crowd were 40 former Beaver wrestlers; during their careers, they accounted for 40 conference titles, 24 All-America finishes and seven national championships.
OSU head coach Joe Wells wasn't happy with how his team performed, but had high praise for Navarro.
"Nathan Navarro made it happen," Wells said. "That's a big step for him."
Navarro, ranked 18th in the country, pinned Kenny Cox of Oregon in 5:55 in a matchup of highly-regarded redshirt freshmen. That got the Beavers within 16-14; coupled with a forfeit win at 133 pounds, it put the Beavers up 20-16 going into the final match.
"It felt great," said Navarro, whose only previous meetings with Cox came when both were high school freshmen in a freestyle tournament.
"He teched me twice," Navarro said of the Cox's wins by technical fall. "I was 0-2 against him the only time I wrestled him."
Navarro went after Cox quickly, scoring a takedown in the opening minute of their match. Navarro led 7-4 after one period and 10-4 after two, then maneuvered his way to the pin.
"I knew he'd break as the match went on - it was just a feeling I had," Navarro said. "The coaches said to keep after him, keep after him, and that's what I did."
Navarro didn't have time to consider how badly the Beavers needed the team points his pin brought.
"I wasn't thinking about that," Navarro said. "I wanted to win by the biggest margin I could. Once I had his head next to the knee, I knew I had the cradle, then I took him over."
With no Duck wrestling at 133, the Beavers bumped Ben Richards up to 141 pounds for the first time in his career. After nearly pinning Oregon's David Watson in the first period, Richards was nearly pinned in the closing seconds. Richards, however, managed to stay off his back and the 8-6 loss to Watson was good enough to prevent Oregon from winning the meet.
"It's a win - but with a little asterisk on it," Wells said. "I'm very disappointed in how we performed. We didn't go out there to get after them, we went out there hoping they'd lay down and they didn't do that at all.
"We had an opportunity to slam the door on them a few times and we didn't do it. I'm very disappointed with some of our leadership. We had guys standing around - you've got to work to make something positive happen. Hand it to Oregon, they came out and wrestled tough."
OSU's top-ranked 149-pounder, Oscar Wood, opened the meet with a 19-6 win over Oregon's Mark Castle, improving Wood's record to 19-1 this season. Beaver heavyweight Mat Orndorff, ranked sixth nationally, won his 11th straight match with a 9-1 victory over Oregon's Kevin Keeney; Orndorff is now 18-3 this season.
After Wood's win, the Ducks won five straight matches until Orndorff started the Beaver comeback.
"Oscar started us off in the right fashion," Wells said. "Then we had opportunities in the matches following that, but we didn't follow through on some of the things we started."
Both OSU and Oregon will compete in dual meets Friday evening at the Oregon Wrestling Classic. OSU will meet Southern Oregon and 10th-ranked Nebraska at Memorial Coliseum, then return home to wrestle Wyoming at Gill Coliseum on the afternoon of Jan. 24.
Wells has some plans for the Beavers before those meets, though.
"Hard work," Wells said, "Is usually the best cure for lethargy."
NO. 18 OREGON STATE 20, OREGON 19 (Amateur Wrestling News national rankings in parentheses)
149 - (1) Oscar Wood, OSU, major dec. Mark Castle, UO, 19-6. 157 - (20) Darryl Christian, UO, dec. (16) Eric Jorgensen, OSU, 7-5. 165 - (11) Sean Morgan, UO, dec. Nathan Coy, OSU, 9-4. 174 - Shawn O'Rourke, UO, dec. Clint Wilson, OSU, 5-3. 184 - (17) Doug Lee, UO, dec. Isaac Weber, OSU, 12-3. 197 - (9) Chael Sonnen, UO, dec. (14) Shane Zajac, OSU, 5-2. HWT - (6) Mat Orndorff, OSU, major dec. Kevin Keeney, UO, 9-1. 125 - (18) Nathan Navarro, OSU, pinned Kenny Cox, UO, 5:55. 133 - Brian Donne, OSU, by forfeit. 141 - David Watson, UO, dec. Ben Richards, OSU, 8-6.
