Last Thursday, Dec. 12 the Midwest City Bombers wrestling team hosted the Ponca City Wildcats in their home opener. The Bombers were down early as the Wildcats lower weight wrestlers took control of many of the early matches, but Midwest City staged a thrilling come back as the weight classes went up yet ultimately fell short of beating Ponca City by a score of 39-37.

Midwest City was down 12-0 before the match even began having to forfeit two of its matches.

“We missed three days of practice,” said Midwest City coach Cory Wilson of the forfeits. “We were out because of inclement weather so we had to scramble to get practices in which led us to giving up two forfeits by not getting down to weight and being sick.”

Midwest City’s Drew Wilson (106 pounds) cut into that deficit early pinning Zach Martin to give Midwest City its first six points.

However, Ponca City took firm control of the duel with the next three matches. The Wildcats’ Austin Burdick (113) pinned Taylor Holman and Cole Burns (132) pinned Micah Smith with Ryan Butler (126) adding three points on a decision against Marquez Edwards. Suddenly, the Ponca City lead jumped to 27-6.

Chance Wilmoth (138) stopped the run for Midwest City taking out Wildcat Chris Hard by a decision, but with the Bombers still down, Ponca City scored another pin when Cory Trotter (145) defeated Iris Conway.

Now, with the match sitting squarely in Ponca City’s favor with a 33-9 lead, Midwest City made its move starting with Evan Wilson (152). Wilson scored four points on a major decision when he beat Kolby Burtner.

Wilson’s effort sprung a comeback. Midwest City pinned the next three Ponca City wrestlers. Larry Boatwright (170) with the pin on Bradyn Presnall, Anthony Sezer (182) with the pin on Austin Fry and Patrick Clason (195) with the pin on Alex Steger cut the Ponca City lead all the way down to 33-31 with two matches left.

But, the momentum wasn’t to last. In an effort to keep from losing the duel on a major decision, Drew Hildebrand (220) fell to Ponca City’s Jordan Kimbrell by pin ending the chances of a Midwest City comeback

Still, the Bombers’ Korey Walker (285) came out and finished his opponent Brett Bridges off with a pin to end the duel with a final score of 39-37.
Midwest City may have lost their home opener, but Coach Wilson was pleased with the effort.

“Giving up 12 points going in and losing by two, I was pretty happy with the outcome,” said Wilson. “We only won two matches last year against Ponca City, and it was our opening duel at their place last year so I think we’ve come a long way.”

Wilson went on to say they still have plenty of things to work on. Hopefully, weather will stay out of their way from now on. Luckily, there’s still plenty of season left to find out.