After two days of tough competition, the Hofstra University wrestling team had two wrestlers place at the Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association (EIWA) Championships on Saturday, March 9. Keaton Kluever placed eighth at 285 pounds to automatically qualify for the NCAA championships while Jurius Clark placed seventh at 157 pounds.
After losing in the quarterfinals to Lewis Fernandes of Cornell University 13-0 during the first day of competition, Kluever beat William Jarrell of American University to move on to day two and automatically qualify. During the consultation quarterfinals, Kluever faced Princeton University’s Matt Cover. To open, he used a duck under to get to Kluever’s legs and took him straight to his back to get a 7-0 lead heading into the second period. There, the two started in neutral but the action quickly stopped as Kluever had to default out of the match. The loss put Kluever into the seventh place match against Grady Griess of the United States Naval Academy, where he medically forfeited to place eighth.
During the first day of competition, Clark beat Jonathan Ley of Navy to move onto the consolation quarterfinals to face Blake Saito of Brown University. After a scoreless first period, Saito rode Clark out during the second period to get two minutes of riding time. In the third period, Saito elected to start at bottom and earned a quick escape to get on the scoreboard and win 2-0.
In his match for seventh place, Clark had a rematch against Long Island University’s Rhise Royster, who beat him 6-1 at the Hofstra Long Island University dual earlier this season. After another scoreless first period, Clark chose bottom in the second period and earned a quick escape. In the third period, Royster took bottom where he got to Clark’s leg and fought for a reversal to make the score 2-1 in his favor. While fighting to keep Clark down Royster was called for locking hands, awarding Clark one point and tying the score 2-2. Clark continued to fight to get to his feet, with Royster getting called for pushing him out on the edge of the mat with five seconds left. Because he already had a stall warning called against him earlier in the match, the call awarded Clark one point to make the score 3-2. Following the conclusion of regulation time, Royster earned a point for riding time to make it 3-3 and force the two into a sudden victory overtime. Neither wrestler scored during the overtime, moving it to two 30-second tiebreaker periods. During the first, Clark started on the bottom and got a last-second escape to put him up 4-3. In the final period, Clark used a leg ride to keep Royster down and win the match, placing seventh.
The Pride ended both days with 15 team points to place sixteenth. Kluever will compete at the NCAA Championships starting Thursday, March 21, and continuing through Saturday, March 23, in Kansas City, Missouri.
Photo courtesy of Dennis Papadatos
