For the second year in a row and sixth time overall, the UNK wrestling team won the national championship. This year’s tournament was tightly contested as the title came down to the 174-pound championship match between UNK’s Otgonbayar Batsuuri and Central Oklahoma’s Hunter Jump.
Jump had previously beaten Batsuuri twice during the regular season. The first defeat occurred in a 1-0 decision at the national duals in January, and the second came in Kearney when Batsuuri was pinned in the third period while leading. This time around, Batsuuri reversed course with a 7-3 decision win and delivered the Lopers their second straight national championship.
“(Batsuuri) was someone we knew, from the get-go, he was very capable of winning the national title,” said Dalton Jensen, UNK wrestling coach. “I’m kind of glad we suffered a couple of losses to that UCO 174-pounder Hunter Jump a couple of times during the year. I think that was a good learning lesson for us to carry into the national finals for something bigger and better.”
The Lopers had a 1.5-point lead over Wisconsin-Parkside after day one when UNK secured six All-Americans: seniors Kaden Hart, Crew Howard, Jackson Kinsella and Trenton Munoz, as well as juniors Joseph Airola and Batsuuri.
Heading into the first-place matches the next night, UNK was in the lead, but needed one win to secure the title. Munoz had the first of three opportunities at 165 pounds after defeating the previously unbeaten one-seed in the semifinals. Munoz said he tried not to think about the team race as he wrestled.
“Honestly, if I thought about it too much, it was a little nerve-wracking,” Munoz said. “So, I kind of was forcing myself to forget about it and just wrestle my match.”
Munoz ended up falling to three-time national champion David Hunsberger of Lander by a 9-4 decision. That match set the stage for Batsuuri to pull off an upset of his own at 174.
“I was a little nervous because I lost twice before (to Jump),” Batsuuri said. “But, all I was thinking was I gotta beat this guy this time.”
After Batsuuri’s win, the title was on its way back to Kearney, with one match left for the Lopers at 285 pounds. Howard had a rematch of last year’s third-place match against Dorian Crosby of Gannon, with this season’s bout going to sudden victory, and saw Crosby grind out the win.
“I put myself in a position to win,” Howard said. “I put it in my hands to go out there and try to score a takedown win, and it didn’t go my way, but that’s okay. I just hang my hat on the fact that I did my best.”
At the end of the day, with seven wrestlers qualifying in the 10 weight classes, it was a team effort to bring gold back to UNK.
“This was a little bit different of a feeling than last year, where I think last year, we won by 52 points and had it wrapped up before finals,” Jensen said. “This one kind of came down to a cooler sports moment where you had to rely on your guys in the finals, and it came down to the wire.”
On top of Batsuuri winning individual gold and Munoz and Howard earning silver, Airola finished fifth, with Hart and Kinsella sixth.
“I can’t say enough about everyone on the team and how hard everyone works,” Howard said. “Not just the guys we brought to nationals, but all 40 guys on the team, they’re all part of this, and it’s just an incredible environment that we have.”
On top of winning the title, Munoz said earning All-American status is a testament to the work everyone put in during the season.
“You combine all the extra workouts that you do on your own, all the practices that you go to with your teammates, having all that accumulate into becoming an All-American,” Munoz said. “It means a lot. It really puts an exclamation point on all the hard work you’ve done throughout the year.”
When the hunt for three in a row begins next season, there will be plenty of new faces in the lineup as the team graduates a big group of seniors that Jensen said was a special class.
“All around, I think these guys clicked together, competed hard, and just happy these guys were able to (win the championship),” Jensen said. “You think about winning, we’ve won three national titles in the last five years. These seniors that you’re talking about, they’ve been part of all three of those teams, and that’s pretty darn special.”
