Section Final Four wrestling! (VIDEO)

Today is a huge, HUGE day! HUGE! This is HUGE!!! Today our B-B-E Jaguars wrestling team will battle for a fourth consecutive trip to the Class 1A state tournament. They will do so beginning with a very tough dual against neighboring and conference rival Paynesville Area in the Section 5A semifinals. The action begins at 12:30 p.m. at Minneota high school. The other semifinal takes place at the same time on the second mat in Minneota's high school, where top-seeded Canby faces No. 5-seeded Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City.

No. 6-seeded Paynesville Area has a 19-9 dual record after earning an upset quarterfinal win by a 31-27 score against No. 3-seeded Minneota. The Bulldogs, ranked No. 10 in the final Guillotine rankings of the regular season, will be "frothing at the mouth" and jacked sky high to take on our Jaguars. It is going to be an incredible battle. I expect both semifinals to be exciting duals. The winners face off after the semis in the Minneota gym for a berth in the team state tournament.

On December 19 at Kimball, our No. 3-ranked Jaguars defeated Paynesville Area 42-19 in a Central Minnesota Conference triangular. They finished 6-0 in the CMC to win their third conference title in the past four seasons. The Bulldogs are having one of their best winters on the mats in over 10 years. They are a program that's on the rise.

Here's Harley Weber winning his heavyweight championship match at the Jaguar Invite in Belgrade on January 5:


More to come with updates to be posted here at about 1 p.m. Once the semifinals are complete, I'll get the final scores posted here as well.

**Update: after the 133 lb match, the Bulldogs have a 15 to 9 lead over our Jaguars. At 139, Ryan Jensen led 18-9 against Paynesville's Masen Hansen.  The Jaguars have a battle on their hands.

Earlier, the Jaguars got a crucial win by Noah Welte at 114 with a pin (3:46). 

After 152, the Jaguars are ahead 23 to 15!

Final: B-B-E 47, Paynesville Area 21. The Jaguars head to the finals! They will square off with Canby for a trip to the state tournament at approximately 2:30 p.m. here in Minneota.

In the other semifinal, Canby prevailed 34-27 against A-C-GC to improve to 12-3 in duals. The Jaguars are 20-2, but one of the two losses was to Canby, who beat our Jaguars 38-29 in Canby on January 26. 

The Section 5A championship should get started at 2:30 p.m. today in Minneota. Updates to follow. I will not be saying one more word about the state tournament until the 5A finals have concluded. We are not there yet!

**In the finals against the Lancers, the score is tied 9-9 after four weights.

Heading into 160 pounds, the Jaguars are ahead 21-15.

**This blog post is a wrap. Find the new blog post to see more!