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SOU nabs third at NAIA tourney By DON HUNT Two individual champions. Two seconds. Ten wrestlers who placed. Seven All-Americans. And more points on the scoreboard than in any previous national tournament. Southern Oregon had all barrels blazing at the NAIA Championships Saturday in an all-out effort to capture its fourth national championship at St. Charles, Mo. But the Raiders settled for third, losing out to Montana State-Northern and Findlay of Ohio in the team standings. Montana State-Northern finished with 151 points, Findlay with 147 and SOU with 133. Embry-Riddle (Arizona) was a distant fourth with 98. Ryan Escobar (125) and Josh Morton (157) claimed individual titles for the Raiders, while Matt Armstrong (165) and Dan Sturgell (184) finished second. "It was an outstanding performance on our part," SOU coach Mike Ritchey said. "Going in I figured we could score between 130 and 145 points, and with a little luck I thought we had a shot at winning the whole thing. "But the other two teams had a little more horsepower than we did. We couldn't have wrestled much better." The Raiders' point total would have been good enough to win the national tournament eight of the past 10 years. Escobar, a sophomore from Placerville, Calif., pinned Pat Runez of Mary, N.D., in the 125-pound championship match. He led 5-0 early in the third period when he took Runez to his back. The fall came five seconds later. "He took a shot, went down on his stomach and I stepped over his leg and caught him," said Escobar, the No. 1 seed who finished the season with a 30-3 record. "This was the first time I was nervous before a match the whole tournament, but all it did was pump me up." Morton, the No. 4 seed at 157 pounds, broke a 2-2 third-period tie with a takedown and a three-point near-fall on the way to a 7-5 win over No. 2 seed Ryan Ludwig of Findlay. Morton, a two-time Washington state high school champion from Spokane who came to the Raiders this season via North Idaho Junior College, earned his ticket to the finals by upsetting No. 1 seed Rudy James of Montana State-Northern 14-10 in the semifinals. "Josh wasn't the favorite coming into the meet, but he rose to the occasion," Ritchey said. "He's an individual spirit and sometimes in wrestling that's what it takes to be a national champion." Morton (25-8) was academically ineligible until the end of Christmas break, but came on strong in January and won the Oregon Classic. "He beat a kid from Wyoming who was a WAC champion -- at that point I knew Morton was on his way," Ritchey said. Armstrong, a senior from Kellogg, Idaho, dropped a 10-5 decision in the finals to Daniel Igali of Simon Fraser. Igali, a member of the Canadian Olympic team who finished third at last year's world freestyle championships, won an NAIA title for the third straight year. He was named most valuable wrestler at this year's NAIA extravaganza. Armstrong finished the year with a 31-6 record. "That was a David vs. Goliath situation," Ritchey said. "That guy (Igali) is for real. It was almost like having Les Gutches competing in the NAIA meet." Sturgell had a 2-0 lead over top-seeded Jeremy Engelhardt of Mary, N.D., going into the third period, but couldn't hold on. Engelhardt scored three unanswered points and added riding time for a 4-2 victory. The Raiders' other placers were Brad Gray, fourth at 197; Jesse Mindlin, fifth at 149; Abe Haddon, fifth at 174; Justin Thurman, seventh at 133; Jamie Haddon, seventh at 197; and Chris Bettineski, eighth at 141. Gray, a freshman from Eagle Point, lost an 8-3 decision to Findlay's Brian Scislo in the third-place match but had a successful tournament, Ritchey said. "He gave the eventual champion his best match of the tournament," Ritchey said. "We had to bump Gray up a weight and so he was wrestling guys who outweighed him by 10 pounds or so, but he had a good tournament." Today's Sports Index Mail Tribune Copyright� The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, OR U.S.A.