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Camacho and Jack still alive at NCAA Div. I championships

North Carolina State’s Ryan Jack, right, the freshman from Danbury, went 1-1 Thursday in his NCAA Tournament debut. (Photo courtesy N.C. State Sports Information)

Danbury High graduates Jakob Camacho and Ryan Jack suffered their first losses in this year’s NCAA Division I wrestling championships Thursday in Detroit but both North Carolina State wrestlers are still alive in the consolation round.

Camacho (125) and Jack (141) are two of the 10 wrestlers still alive for North Carolina State after the first day of wrestling at Little Caesar’s Arena.

North Carolina State has four wrestlers in the quarterfinals and sits in third place after day one. Penn State leads the field with 27½ points with Arizona State second with 22 points and the Wolfpack in third place with 21½ points. Only Iowa and N.C. State have 10 wrestlers left in the tournament.

Wrestling begins at 11 a.m. Friday morning in Detroit. Coverage will be on ESPNU in the morning and on ESPN for the evening session. Each bout and every mat is available on ESPN3.

Camacho, the No. 14 seed, won his first match with an 8-3 win over No. 19 Joey Prata of Oklahoma. He scored all three takedowns in the bout, one in each period, and added in 1:26 of riding time.

But in the second round, Camacho (17-5) lost to No. 3 seed Patrick Glory of Princeton, 10-2. Glory had two takedowns in the first period on the way to a 4-1 lead, and after a scoreless second, Glory pulled away with an escape and a takedown in the first minute before punctuating the win with a takedown in the closing seconds, along with the riding-time point.

Camacho faces No. 13 Drake Ayala of Iowa (17-7) this morning in the consolation round.

Jack, No. 18 seed making his first NCAA tournament appearance, dropped his first round match to No. 15 Kizhan Clark of North Carolina, 4-3. Jack got the first takedown of the match, going right after Clark after the opening whistle.

Clark cut the lead to one with an escape and took a 3-2 lead with his own takedown with 28 seconds left in the first period on the edge of the mat. Clark extended the lead to 4-2 with an escape in the second period.

Jack escaped with 1:06 left in the third period but couldn’t secure a takedown in a 4-3 loss.

Jack (17-8) won his first consolation round match with a 10-5 win over No. 31 Wilfredo Gil of Franklin & Marshall. Jack recorded all five takedowns of the bout and added in 3:07 of ride time.

Jack will face No. 16 Quinn Kinner of Rider (19-7) in the consolation round on Friday morning.

North Carolina State’s four quarterfinal wrestlers are Tariq Wilson (149), Ed Scott (157), Hayden Hidlay (174) and Trent Hidlay (184).

Live brackets can be found on TrackWrestling.com. Results of the tournament can also be followed at FloArena.

Gerry deSimas, Jr., is the editor and founder of Connecticut Wrestling Online. He is an award-winning writer and has been covering sports in Connecticut and New England for more than 40 years. He was inducted into the New England High School Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2018.

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