Jackson wrestlers attempt to repeat at Tiger Classic

~ The Indians are among the favorites at the Tiger Classic

It's a good time to be in classic form.

And the Jackson wrestling team appears to be in just that as it begins defense of its Tiger Classic title tonight.

The Indians are coming off a dominating performance at the 11-team Ray Dowdy Invitational hosted by Ritenour High School last week. Jackson sent nine wrestlers into the finals and emerged with five champions.

Three of those champions will attempt to repeat as Tiger Classic champions this weekend.

Junior Jarrett Reisenbichler is a two-time champion at 106 but will move up to 113, while 138-pound senior Tyler Rush (138) and heavyweight junior Preston Hobeck (HWT) will defend the weight-class titles they won last year.

Jackson won four individual championships at last year's Tiger Classic and had wrestlers in seven of the 14 finals in winning the meet for the first time since 2008. Six of those seven wrestlers are in this year's lineup with the return of juniors Clayton Collier (152) and Josh Stone (182) and senior Clay Darnell (220).

"It's always nice to win a tournament and be the returning champions, but sometimes it puts a little pressure on you for the next year," Jackson coach Steve Wachter said. "We kind of look at it like we do every tournament with trying to be the best we can be and see where it puts us."

The 15-team meet begins at 5 p.m. today, and concludes with Saturday's championship matches that start around 5 p.m.

The 40th edition of the tournament will be waged at the new Central High School campus for the first time after previously being held at the old location, which is now Central Junior High School.

Jackson has been among the annual favorites. The Indians finished as runner-up the previous three years before winning in 2012 and have landed outside the top four only once since 1990.

This season, snow has been the only way to stop the Indians. Their opening tournament at Parkway South was postponed. Otherwise, the Indians are 4-0 in duals in addition to winning at Ritenour.

Jackson placed all 14 of its wrestlers in the top five in winning at Ritenour.

"What I really like was we did some things technically pretty good for our first tournament since we missed the first one," Wachter said. "Of course, we've still got a lot of things to work on and a long way to go, but for this early in the season we did some pretty good things at that tournament."

Overall team performance can outweigh individual achievement in tournament standings. That was the case for the Indians in 2010 when they had seven individual champions but finished second to Christian Brothers of Memphis, Tenn., in the team standings.

Central coach James Brake said he expects Jackson to receive a strong challenge from Northwest, last year's runner-up and the 2011 champion, as well as Ste. Genevieve, Sikeston and Francis Howell North, who all finished in the top six last year.

"I think it might be really close this year," Brake said. "There are some tough teams in there."

Other teams in the field are Central, Notre Dame, De Soto, Hillsboro, Mehlville, Rolla, Union, Christian County (Ky.), Sullivan and University City.

Missing from last year's field are Dexter and Rockwood Summit.

"I think Northwest could be the team to beat," Wachter said.

The Northwest squad may have the same thoughts about Jackson.

Reisenbichler, sophomore Jake Byrd, Collier, Rush and Hobeck are all unbeaten. Reisenbichler, Rush, Byrd, Collier, Darnell and Stone all were state qualifiers last year. Reisenbichler finished second in Class 4 at 106 pounds, while Rush was fifth at 138 to also earn all-state honors.

"They're loaded, no doubt about it," Brake said about the Indians.

Central finished 15th last year, while Notre Dame was 16th.

Other returning individual champions in the field are Ste. Genevieve's Travis Jones (120) and De Soto's Aaron Minx (132).

Noteworthy

* The Central High School boys basketball games against Farmington will be played at Central Junior High School tonight due to the wrestling tournament. All fans wearing orange will receive admission for $1. The JV game is at 6 p.m. with the varsity contest to follow at 7:30 p.m.