Mason Harris Claims Gold, Sandites Place 3rd at Bobby Lyons Invitational

View fullsize

A championship victory from heavyweight Mason Harris led the Charles Page High School boys’ wrestling team to a third place finish at the 60th annual Bobby Lyons Invitational Saturday afternoon at the Ed Dubie Field House.

Harris pinned his first four opponents before earning a 2-0 decision against Bixby senior Garrett Ritter in the finals to become the first Sandite to win the tournament since 2019.

“Me and Ritter - we’ve wrestled, I think, every year of high school,” said Harris, a senior three-time State qualifier.

“Last year he caught me in a dual and I wasn’t going to let that happen ever again. I was watching the whole tournament because I knew he was going to be most likely who I’d face in the finals.”

“He was wrestling really defensive through the tournament so I knew I was going to face a true heavyweight match where it’s just a lot of bear-hugging,” said Harris.

“First period that’s what we did, we just bear hugged the entire time, just working for position, fighting each other’s hands. And then going into the second (period), I got lucky and won the toss…escaped to a reversal, rode him out for the rest of the second.”

In the third period Ritter selected neutral but Harris successfully fended off the Spartan’s attacks to earn his first tournament title of the season after a pair of runner-up finishes at Enid and Jenks. He improved to 25-2 on the season with his second career victory.

“I’ve been in the Bobby Lyons tournament every year of high school and haven’t ever won it,” said Harris. “I’ve placed once or twice. It feels good winning our home tournament in the actual Dubie. It’s a good win to have for your senior season.”

Emphasis on “in the actual Dubie” because the tournament rotates annually with Sapulpa, where it’s called the Jerry Billings Invitational in odd-numbered years.

Allen, Texas won the tournament for the second time in the past three years, taking the trophy back from defending champion Bixby. Allen scored 368.5 points with eight finalists and three champions while Bixby had 327.5 points with three finalists and two champions.

Harris’s victory in the final match of the day helped Sand Springs to tie Garden City, Kansas at 308 points. It was the best finish for the Sandites at their home tournament since 2018.

“We were coming off the District Champ high,” said head coach Ty Bowling. “I think we started a little slow but overall I thought we wrestled really well.”

Co-host Sapulpa placed 8th for its best finish since 2021, but trailed rival Sand Springs for the 12th consecutive year.

Harris was the only finalist for the Sandites, but David Ritchey, Isaac Sensintaffar, Brody Ensten, Zander Grigsby, and Jaxon Trotter all advanced to the consolation finals.

“We had a real strong consolation semi,” said Bowling. “I think we only lost one match there. We had a good finish to the day.”

Ritchey (9-4) placed third at 120 with his only loss coming to tournament champion Bryson Humphries, from Owasso, in the semifinals. In the placement round he won 6-0 against Missouri State qualifier Paxton Martin.

Sensintaffar (15-6) placed third at 150, winning six matches in a row after dropping his first match 5-4 to Bixby’s Rhys Novosad. He won an 11-3 rematch with Novosad in consolation and pinned Collinsville’s Cable Golden in the placement round.

Zander Grigsby (24-1) saw his undefeated start to the season come to an end in the 165-pound semifinals in a 3-1 decision to Brady Benham, a three-time State Champion from Sperry.

“We knew who he was, we just didn’t know much about him just because we never see Sperry,” said Bowling. “If we had known more going into it we would have had a better game plan, but he wrestled really well, made one minor mistake and that kid was able to capitalize on it.”

“But I think (Grigsby) wrestled solid and I think we could get him if we wrestled him again.”

He bounced back handily with a pair of pins in consolation for third place, taking down Prosper’s Jack Ringger for third place.

Jaxon Trotter (24-6) pinned his first two opponents before falling to State Champion Jayden Moore from Tahlequah in the 175-pound semifinals. In consolation he won a pair of major decisions, taking down Bixby State qualifier Colton Kaiser 9-1 for third place.

Ensten (20-8) placed fourth at 157, winning his first two matches before falling to top-seeded Texas State qualifier Carter Nekvapil in the semifinals. In consolation he won a 15-9 upset over four-seed Isaac Colon-Arce before falling 3-1 to Sapulpa State qualifier Blake Hurt.

Peyton Callis (25-7) placed fifth at 190, Hunter Spencer (4-4) placed fifth at 126, and Kase Skaggs (20-6) placed sixth at 120.

No. 5 Sand Springs (10-0) will look to wrap up a perfect regular season when it travels to No. 3 Broken Arrow (7-0) Thursday at 6:00 p.m.

“That has seeding implications for Dual State,” said Bowling. “If we can find a way to beat Broken Arrow, we would probably be the three seed. If not, we’ll probably be at four or five. Broken Arrow’s a traditionally tough wrestling squad so we’re going to have to have all our guys show up mentally prepared.”

Sand Springs will also compete in the one-day Skiatook Tournament on Friday with both its varsity and JV squads.