Augello, Miracle and Mensah advance to the 2017 WCWA finals

Augello (left) goes for her third WCWA title tomorrow. Photo: Dan Lobdell, Flowrestling

WCWA brackets on Trackwrestling

VIDEO: Finalists interviews

OKLAHOMA CITY – The finals matchups of the 2017 WCWA Women’s College Nationals were determined on Friday night at the Abe Lemons Arena at Oklahoma City University.

King University leads the team race with 167.5 points, pulling six into the finals. Simon Fraser is in second with 125.5 points.

Tomorrow night’s finals will pit sister against sister as King University’s Marina Doi and Regina Doi both advanced to the 101-pound finals.

Marina seeks her second-straight national title, while Regina improves upon her 2016 fifth-place finish.

Marina blazed through the bracket with two tech falls and a fall. In the semis, Hiba Salem of Menlo College held her to just a 7-0 win, making it Marina’s only win of the year without bonus points.

Regina put up two wins by technical fall to earn her spot in the semifinals. There she went up against three-time All-American Sarah Allen of Cumberlands, where she grinded out a 6-0 win despite taking two injury timeouts.

“I don’t know if the WCWA allows co-champs,” Marina said. “I mean if they do that’s great. Every national tournament we’ve been in the finals together, minus like Cadet and Junior World Team Trials. If we didn’t have to wrestle we could win it together. I’m not sure if they allow it. If they don’t, we’ll just have to wrestle it out.”

At 109 pounds, Breonnah Neal will also wear a King singlet in the finals. Tomorrow night will mark her third trip to the finals.

Neal tallied four tech falls on the day, giving up just two points to outscore her opponents 44-2.

Securing her second trip to the finals, Amy Fearnside of Jamestown emerged from the bottom side of the bracket with a performance almost identical to Neal’s, producing the same scores.

King junior Haley Augello will have the chance to wrestle for her third WCWA national title tomorrow night as she faces third-seeded Cady Chessin of Menlo College in the 116-pound finals.

2016 Olympian Augello, who took an Olympic redshirt year last season, lit up the field, spending less than a total of three minutes on the mat throughout the day.

She wrapped up day one of competition with a fall in the semifinals over Jathiya Isaac of Wayland Baptist in 39 seconds.

“There’s always room for improvement,” Augello said. “I wanted to come out here and try some moves, get some shots because I’ve been going into a front headlock a lot lately. I think I definitely did well at opening up my offense after not really wrestling college girls in the past year.”

Her opponent Chessin is making her second appearance the WCWA finals after knocking off No. 2-seed Abby Lloyd of Simon Fraser in the semifinals with a 2-1 win.

Her last finals experience ended in a loss to King’s Sarah Hildebrandt by fall in the 2014 123-pound finals.

No. 4 Andribeth Rivera of Campbellsville registered a semifinals upset over top-seeded Hanna Grisewood of King, 5-4, to secure her spot in the 123-pounds finals.

Rivera is slated to take on third-seeded SFU’s Dominique Parrish, who took out No. 2 Tarkyia Mensah of Wayland Baptist with a 12-0 tech fall in the semis.

At 130 pounds, top-seeded Megan Black pinned her way to the finals.

In the quarters, Black, now a two-time finalist, stuck Ismilena Valles of Cumberlands in 2:55 before moving onto the semis, where she ended her match against Shelby Hall of Campbellsville in 31 seconds.

With five bonus-point wins on the day, Cheyenne Youngblood of Missouri Baptist earned her spot in the finals.

In her quarterfinals and semifinals matches, Youngblood collectively scored 29 points while giving up only nine.

2017 U.S. Senior Nationals champion Kayla Miracle will go after her third-straight WCWA championship tomorrow night at 136 pounds.

Miracle, fresh off a silver-medal performance at the Dave Schultz Memorial International, put together an impressive day on Friday with three falls and a tech fall.

“I’m feeling great. It’s my third time (in the finals),” Miracle said. “I’ve won the past two so I’m kind of nervous because if I lose that’s sad. But just wrestling through, the team needs as many pins as we can so any time I can get a pin, it’s great. Anything can happen at any moment. You can’t beat anyone but you can pin anyone type of mentality. So if I’m on the mat for too long, something weird could happen and I could lose that title. So, ending it as quick as I can.”

Waiting for her in the finals will be teammate and training partner Koral Sugiyama, who pulled out a couple of exciting wins during the day.

Sugiyama defeated No. 2-seed Fran Giorgio of Simon Fraser in the quarterfinals with a second-period fall, sending the fans into a frenzy. She capped off the night with a thrilling 8-8 win over Nicole Depa from SFU, scoring in the final six seconds to win on criteria.

Representing Simon Fraser in the finals is reigning 143-pound champion Mallory Velte, who earned spots on the U.S. National Team at two different weights in 2016.

Velte crushed the competition without surrendering a single point on the day and putting up 43 points. Her semis match against Desiree Zavala of Southern Oregon was the only match that was taken into the second period, even if it was only for 38 seconds.

Looking to knock off the returning champ is two-time All-American Jessi Kee of King. This is Kee’s second appearance in the finals. Her first came in 2015, when she fell to Missouri Valley’s Jacarra Winchester.

Kee racked up three wins on the day, including a 10-0 semis win over Montana Drum of Missouri Baptist.

2016 Olympic Team Trials champ and 2014 WCWA champ Tamyra Mensah of Wayland Baptist cruised through to the 155-pound finals in her first WCWA tournament since 2014.

Mensah, fresh off an Ivan Yarygin Memorial championship, showed no signs of slowing down, picking up a first-period fall in the quarters and a 12-1 tech fall in the semis.

“I feel like my performance is pretty good,” Mensah said. “My semifinals match I got into my own head when I bit my tongue, but I can’t let little things like that get to me. I didn’t. Overall, I’m really enjoying it. It’s exciting to be competing in this level of wrestling.”

Also punching her ticket to the finals is Niauni Hill of Lindenwood Belleville.

Hill teched Tatum Sparks from Southwestern Oregon in the quarterfinals before taking a win by injury default over Kiera Gabaldon of Warner Pacific.

The 170-pound finals promises to be a good one as Jessika Rottier of Cumberlands and Forrest Molinari of King meet up in a rematch of the 2016 155-pound finals.

Molinari took the crown last year with a 7-0 win over Rottier.

This year, with both at a new weight, Rottier holds the No. 1 ranking in the nation as well as the No. 1 seed.

Both wrestlers turned in impressive performances on the day, with three falls each and were held to decisions in their semifinals matches.

At 191 pounds, Paige Baynes of Lindenwood made it to the finals with four tech falls to improve on a sixth-place finish at last year’s WCWAs.

She’ll face No.2-seed Payten Smith of Simon Fraser tomorrow night.
Smith won her quarterfinals and semifinals match by decision over Alyssa Cantu of Missouri Valley and Kierra Boyce of Wayland Baptist, respectively.

Tomorrow morning’s session will start at 10 a.m. with the wrestlebacks. Finals are scheduled to start at 5 p.m. All sessions will be streamed live on Flowrestling.com and brackets can be found on trackwrestling.com. 

WCWA WOMEN’S COLLEGE NATIONALS
At Oklahoma City, Okla.

Finals matchups
101: No. 1 Marina Doi (King) vs. No. 2 Regina Doi (King)
109: No. 1 Breonnah Neal (King) vs. Amy Fearnside (Jamestown)
116: No. 1 Haley Augello (King) vs. No. 3 Cady Chessin (Menlo)
123: No. 3 Dominique Parrish (Simon Fraser) vs. No. 4 Andribeth Rivera (Campbellsville)
130: No. 1 Megan Black (McKendree) vs. No. 2 Cheyenne Youngblood (Missouri Baptist)
136: No. 1 Kayla Miracle (Campbellsville) vs. Koral Sugiyama (Campbellsville)
143: No. 1 Mallory Velte (Simon Fraser) vs. No. 2 Jessi Kee (King)
155: No. 1 Tamyra Mensah (Wayland Baptist) vs. No. 2 Niauni Hill (Lindenwood Belleville)
170: No. 1 Jessika Rottier (Cumberlands) vs. No. 2 Forrest Molinari (King)
191: No. 1 Paige Baynes (Lindenwood) vs. No. 2 Payten Smith (Simon Fraser)