YORK (Pa.) – Freshman Evan Widing earned a fifth place finish to lead the Delaware Valley University wrestling team at the New Standard Corporation Invitational at York College, but the Aggies finished at the bottom of the pack with 22.5 team points.

The Aggies sent 10 wrestlers to the tournament and six were still alive on Saturday, including senior Kordell Rush (133 lbs.), freshmen Evan Widing (149 lbs.) and Austin Williams (184 lbs.) who all advanced to the quarterfinal round, while freshman Alec Meyers (165 lbs.), senior Anthony Costanza and sophomore Kyle Hillermeier (184 lbs.) were wrestling in the consolation bracket. As a team, DelVal had 8.5 points after day one while The College of New Jersey is in first place going into day two with 47 points.

Widing used a convincing 16-0 tech fall to get by Jacob Boyd of Merchant Marine in the first round and then he defeated Josh Paisley of Elizabethtown 9-6. Widing trailed Paisley, 2-1, going into the third period before he recorded two takedowns, a reversal, and a near fall to close out the decision. His first match on Saturday was against Tyler Gazaway of Roger Williams and Widing dropped a tight decision, 2-0, to drop into the consolation bracket. He won his first consolation match with a late first period pin, but dropped the semi-final bout. In the battle for fifth place, Widing got past Gagliano with another pin, this time in the second period.

Rush was awarded a first round bye and needed just one win on Friday night to get to the quarterfinal round. He took on Ryan Manahan from The College of New Jersey and got a late first period takedown to go up 2-0. He nearly pinned Manahan in the second and was awarded near fall points and held on in the third period for the 4-1 decision. Rush was slated to battle Freddy Eckles of Johnson & Wales in the quarterfinals, but had to forfeit due to a nagging injury.

Williams had a bye to start the day and then needed a hard fought victory over George Moseley of Averett to advance the quarterfinal round. Williams gave up two takedowns early on and fell into a 4-0 hole, but battled back to cut the deficit to 6-3 going into the second. In the second, he took down Moseley and earned near fall points to take a one point, 7-6, lead going into the third. Early in the final stanza he worked a two-point reversal and allowed just one escape the rest of the way to secure the 9-7 decision. Williams was pitted against Joe Yanis of Brockport in his quarterfinal match on Saturday, and was pinned with 30 ticks left in the second period. In the consolation bracket he fell to Nick Caracappa, 11-4, to end his run.

Meyers took down William Merritt in his first match with a 4-0 decision.                He controlled the match the whole way with a first period takedown, an escape in the second, and riding time for the final score. In his second match he was bested by Dominick Reyes of Johns Hopkins in a 17-2 tech fall. Meyers was pinned in his first consolation match by Jesse Rocco from York on Saturday.

Also at 184 pounds, despite going 0-1 on Friday, Costanza and Hillermeier are still alive in the consolation bracket. Costanza dropped a 13-5 major decision to Anthony Malfitano of Roger Williams and will face Ryan Doyle of host York College in his first match on Saturday while Hillermeier is slated to battle Nick Caracappa of Johnson & Wales. Both Costanza and HIllermeier dropped their first matches on Saturday and were eliminated from the bracket.

Jonshon & Wales took home the team title with 158 points five top-3 finishers and TCNJ placed second with 127 points.