For the second-straight season, senior 285-pounder Jake Evans and junior 197-pounder Ken Burrs will represent Waynesburg University at the NCAA Division III National Tournament. Each wrestler finished in second place at the Division III Southeast Regional Tournament at their respective weight classes. Collectively, the Yellow Jackets placed ninth out of 20 teams in the region.

“I’m just proud of the guys,” head coach Ron Headlee said. “We still have two qualifiers, you always want more but the guys wrestled hard.”

Evans, the returning DIII 285-pound national champion, rolled to three straight victories to start off the two-day event to make it to the title bout. There, he squared up with the No. 2 seed in Lycoming College’s Garrett Wesneski, ranked fifth nationally in DIII. Wesneski managed to just get by Evans, defeating him 5-4 for his first DIII loss of the season.

“It wasn’t one of his better matches, but it’s always better to happen [at regionals] where you have one of those matches,” Headlee said. “And I think it takes a little bit [of pressure] off. It’s hard going in with no losses coming in like that at DIII and defending [his title]–there’s all that kind of pressure. Now I think it settles you in and now you have to work a little harder and you have to know that everybody’s gunning for you.”

The Elizabeth native has now extended his NCAA wins record to 179 heading into the national tournament, and also has 28 pins this season, which leads all of DIII.

Burrs, who was competing for the first time since the Kalahari Duals this past December due to an injury, also won his first three matches of the day before taking an injury default in the title bout, which Headlee said was a precautionary move since he already qualified for nationals.

“His movement looks good, I thought his conditioning–I was a little skeptical about it because it was his first time back–but he did well,” Headlee said. “It was good to see his excitement for winning and things like that. If he wrestles [well], we can have two All-Americans.”

In total, five Jackets competed on the second day of the tournament for the chance to go to nationals. Sophomore 133-pounder Josh Kuslock came within one win of qualifying for the national tournament but came up just shy in the third-place match with a 10-9 loss to Delaware Valley freshman Russell Benson.

In that match, Kuslock trailed 6-0 in the first period before battling back to make it 9-6 in favor of Benson heading into the final period. Kuslock managed to tie the score at nine with a late takedown, but Benson picked up an escape to barely edge the PAC-Champion.

“You never blame guys being aggressive, but Josh got a little overaggressive and got caught for six points [early]. He just kept his composure and kept fighting back,” Headlee said. “At one point he almost had four back points instead of two–that would’ve been huge in the match. Just came up a little bit short, but [he] still had a great second semester for us.”

Kuslock finished his sophomore campaign with 19 wins.

Freshman 125-pounder Dylan Williams and redshirt-sophomore 174-pounder Anthony Welsh each placed eighth in their respective weight classes. Both needed three-straight wins on day two to make it to nationals, but they lost their first matches of the day to drop into the seventh-place bouts.

Williams was just 8-22 on the year heading into the regional tournament but was coming off a PAC title at 125 pounds and snagged two more wins to place during the two-day event. Welsh, who transferred into Waynesburg for the spring semester, completed his first year as a Yellow Jacket with an 18-7 record.

Headlee was pleased to see Williams’ ability shine at the regional tournament after a slow start to his season.

“I just knew with his confidence–he has the ability in the room, and I’ve known that, it was just a matter of him believing in himself,” Headlee said. “I think winning PAC’s helped him and getting that one win–sometimes it just changes [your mentality]. He wrestled well all weekend.”

In the regional tournament as a team, Waynesburg placed the highest of the three PAC schools, coming in ninth. Washington & Jefferson placed 12^th in the event, while Thiel took 15^th place.

Six total wrestlers from the PAC, which only has three schools that support wrestling programs, punched a ticket to the national tournament in the event. Three W&J wrestlers and one Thiel wrestler will join Evans and Burrs to compete for a national championship.

Headlee anticipates the 285-pound weight class to be extremely competitive, with three contending wrestlers undefeated against DIII opponents, making Evans’ road to repeating difficult.

“[Jake is] definitely going to have to be ready, it’s not going to be easy. [He’s going to] train hard these next two weeks,” Headlee said. “He’s usually up for a good challenge and after a loss he’s even better, so hopefully he will refocus. That’s his goal–to come back and win it.”

The NCAA Division III National Tournament will take place Saturday, March 8 and Sunday, March 9 in Roanoke, Virginia. Evans will look to defend his national title from last year, while Burrs will look to place as an All-American after going 1-2 in the tournament last year.

“That’s the goal, to try and come home with two All-Americans…it’d be nice to come back with that again,” Headlee said.