Lee’s Summit West / Blue Springs / William Chrisman Tri Dual Recap

The Blue Springs wrestling team has been rebuilding the past few seasons and head coach Bobbe Lowe noted the 2023-24 Wildcats are young and inexperienced.

However, the Wildcats have some wrestlers who are on the rise and that was on display at Wednesday’s tri dual against William Chrisman and Lee’s Summit West at home.

Wrestler Interviews:

Freshman Jackson Paulsen and seniors Conor Tindle and Mykael Myers each finished 2-0 as the Wildcats defeated the Bears 66-12 but fell to the Titans 40-24.

William Chrisman lost to West 62-11 in the other dual.

Even as a freshman, Paulsen (126 pounds) has become a leader for Blue Springs, Lowe said. He’s a Wildcat who had a bright future. After his two wins on Wednesday, he improved to 20-6 on the season.

“He’s coachable and he works hard,” Lowe said. “He puts a lot of time in and has a very bright future.”

In Paulsen’s matches, he pinned both Chrisman’s Rony Guardiola and West’s Braylen Koelzer. He said he started of slow in his first match and then started picking up the pace going forward.

“In my second match, I did better and was able to stay out of ties,” Paulsen said. “I was able to get my fakes in and double legs.”

Tindle is another Wildcat on the rise as he is one of the favorites to win the state championship in the Class 4, 285-pound division. On Saturday, he has a breakout performance, placing in second at the Suburban Conference Tournament and pinning defending state champion Elmotie Williams of Liberty North.

Wednesday, he pinned Chrisman’s Logan Perrin in the first period and edged out West’s Tony Miller 3-2 after pinning him in 12 seconds during the conference tournament.

“I could’ve done a little more on my feet, but I came out with the win,” Tindle said of his match with Miller. “I just have to keep grinding in the wrestling room. I need to work on new things. I can’t keep doing the same things.”

While Tindle is currently ranked No. 2 in his weight class according to the MissouriWrestling.com poll, he will have his work cut out for him in the Class 4 District 4 Tournament. Five of the top six wrestlers in his division, including No. 1-ranked Trenton Bindel of Liberty, will all be in his bracket at districts.

“We have five dudes in our district who are really, really good,” Lowe said. “He’s in a tough, deep weight class so he’s going to have to be on point. We have 4 ½ to five weeks to get there.”

Miles (225) is attempting to make a name for himself in his final season as he is in his second year on the varsity team. On Saturday, he had a forfeit victory and edged out West’s Austin Seaboldt 3-1 with a clutch takedown in the third period.

“I feel like I could have worked better on bottom and go out a little faster,” Miles said. “I could’ve worked better on my feet and got more takedowns, but I am going to work on those things.

“I am actually doing better than last year and that’s surprising because I moved up a weight class.”

For Chrisman, two wrestlers finished the day 2-0 as the Bears are also rebuilding their program.

Returning state qualifier Javarien Jeffries is looking for his first state medal as a junior and is 3-0 so far this season after missing much of it due to undisclosed reasons. He pinned Blue Springs’ Travis Birkenmaier and won by tech fall 20-3 over West’s Chase Hinton.

“I feel like did pretty well but I could’ve been a little better,” Jeffries said. “My first round, I could’ve got a pin but a tech fall is a tech fall. My positioning and my hand fighting have been pretty good.”

Vershawn Dudley Jr. was the other Bears wrestler to end the day unbeaten with pins against Blue Springs’ Myles Weatherspoon and West’s Mo West.

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Written by Michael Smith

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