Glenwood Springs High School’s Amos Wilson worked his way back through the consolation rounds of the 3A State Wrestling Championships Saturday to claim third place at 182 pounds.
After a tough loss in the championship semifinal Friday night, Wilson returned for the final day of action at Denver’s Pepsi Center on Saturday with something to prove.
In the consolation semifinal, the senior Demon pinned Severance freshman Colby Runner in 3 minutes, 58 seconds to advance to the third-place match.
Then, wrestling for the bronze, Wilson dominated in his match with junior Braden Baumgartner of Weld Central, winning by a 9-5 decision.
“I just wanted to come back and do the best I could to shake off that (semifinal) loss and work to achieve the next best thing,” Wilson said Saturday evening as he was headed back to the Pepsi Center for the championship bouts.
“I knew I just needed to come back and finish as strong as could, and be able to achieve what I wanted to do next,” he said.
Wilson’s older brother, Myles, was a two-time state wrestling champion for GSHS in 2016 and 2017, and now wrestles for the University of Iowa.
In other final-day action Saturday, Grand Valley sophomore Hayden Grice was paired with Basalt senior Ernesto Lopez in the consolation semifinal at 285 pounds.
Lopez prevailed, pinning Grice in 4:04, en route to a fourth-place finish. In the third-place bout, Lopez was pinned in 0:18 seconds by Sy Spitz of Lamar.
The fifth-place match paired Grice with senior Carlos Flores of Alameda. Flores got the pin in 4:04.
Two other local wrestlers were still in action Saturday morning, including Rifle senior Cauy Smith at 126 pounds. In the third round of consolation, Mark Troni of Mullen pinned Smith in 3:29.
And, wrestling at 170 pounds, Basalt junior Ruben Samuelson lost in the third round of consolation by 11-8 decision to Morgan Tribbett of Eaton to conclude his campaign for a podium spot.
