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Cedar Rapids, IA - Kaleb Loht earned the National Championship on Saturday in the 141 lb. weight class to lead Messiah to third place in Division III. The Falcons finished third with 60 points--the highest team finish ever for Messiah. Lucas Malmberg finishes in second place at 125 followed by Josh Thomson in fourth at 184 and Ricardo Plummer in fifth at 174.

Loht became the second individual champion in school history after Mike Helm achieved the feat in 2000 at 157 pounds. This is the first time that Messiah has had more than two All-Americans in the same year.

In addition to all of the individual accolades, head coach Bryan Brunk was awarded Coach of the Year and assistant Domineak Commodore was awarded Assistant Coach of the Year.

Kaleb Loht wrestled through a scoreless first period with Matt Adcock but finished it off with a 6-3 decision victory. Loht went up 5-1 after an escape to start the third period. Adcock fought back to get a takedown, closing the gap to 5-3 but Loht escaped again and fended off Adcock's attacks for the win.

Mike Fuenffinger defeated Lucas Malmberg in the Championship bout with a 12-3 major decision, giving Malmberg the 2nd place finish at 125 pounds. Malmberg found himself underneath Fuenffinger early on in the match and could not find a way to escape. Malmberg didn't get much of a chance to score points but when he did he got two points for a nearfall and one for an escape.

Starting off day two was Lucas Malmberg defeating Gilberto Camacho of Wartburg in a close 5-4 semifinal match. Camacho wrestled defensively to keep Malmberg from scoring so Malmberg used a reversal to start the second period. Malmberg eventually got his takedown in the third period and rode out Camacho for the win.
 
Kaleb Loht looked in complete control in his semifinal match against Michael Ferinde of Johnson & Wales. Loht won with a 10-3 decision, riding on top of Ferinde for most of the bout. Ferinde spoiled a major decision victory with a takedown near the end of the match.
 
Ricardo Plummer fought hard in his semifinal match but could not gain advantage over Landon Williams of Wartburg and lost 6-3. Plummer then lost his consolation semifinal match to Ethan Ball of Coe College 10-3, putting him in the fifth place match.
 
Plummer squared off against Zach Zotollo of TCNJ for fifth place—an opponent Plummer defeated earlier in the year 3-2. Plummer went down in the match 4-0 but came back to tie the match at 5-5 and take it into overtime. The senior then secured a takedown in overtime to win fifth place 7-5.
 
After missing out on All-American status in last year's championship, Plummer made it happen this year with the top-eight finish.
 
Josh Thomson repeats as All-American in 2014 with a fourth place finish, losing his third-place match against Christian Chorzepa of Williams. Thomson made it to the third place match with an 8-3 win in the consolation semifinals over Caleb Malychewski of Pacific (Or.).
 
Thomson and Chorzepa wrestled a high scoring match at 12-10. Thomson looked to be in control near the end, winning 10-7, but Chorzepa found another gear and scored four points on Thomson in the last 30 seconds.

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Friday Night Recap

Three Messiah wrestlers have advanced to the semifinals of the Championship, while one remains in the consolation brackets heading into Saturday's action. The Falcons currently stand in second place in the team standings with 38 points behind Wartburg's 56.5.

Kaleb Loht (141) and Josh Thomson (184) both won their preliminary matches with pins to move on to the first round of bouts. Loht's came at 5:55 in the match, while Thomson finished off his opponent in 1:08 in the first period. Loht then won his next match with a 7-3 decision and Thomson won in an 11-2 major decision.

Lucas Malmberg defeated his first round opponent 14-4, and Ricardo Plummer won 5-4. Stephen Cannon was the only Falcon to lose a match in round one but didn't go down without a fight. Cannon went down 11-0 quickly but fought back with seven straight points. The final three of those points were awarded for a nearfall that almost gave Cannon a stunning win.

Malmberg advanced to the semifinals with another major decision, defeating Robert Bidlingmaier of Olivet 13-3. Malmberg scored his points in the first and third periods, having been underneath Bidlingmaier for most of the second.

Advancing to the semifinals with a 9-5 decision was Loht, over Matt Holmes of Loras. Loht started the third period with a revearsal but Holmes countered with an escape followed by a takedown. Holmes didn't ride for long as Loht quickly revearsed Holmes for a second time and held on to win.

Stephen Cannon advanced to the second round of consolations by defeating the No. 6 seed Josh Sampson. Cannon went down 4-1 into the second period but came back to tie at 4-4. The match again tied at 6-6 to open the third with Cannon on top. After a short amount of time, Cannon gave Sampson the escape due to Sampson's amount of riding time. With under a minute left Cannon secured a takedown and stayed on top for the win.

The third and final wrestler to advance to the semifinals was Ricardo Plummer with a 9-6 victory over Lou Puca of SUNY-Cortland.

Thomson's road to the semifinals was blocked by No. 1 seed Riley Lefever of Wabash in an 8-6 loss. Thomson got a few takedowns but could not find a way to gain advantage when he was on top of Lefever. Thomson later defeated Christian Harrison of Concordia-Moorhead 4-1 to stay in the consolations.

Cannon exited the tournament after a second-round consolation loss to No. 4 Cedric Gibson of UW-Whitewater

Continue to follow the Championship here on GoMessiah.com as well as on Twitter: @MessiahSports. The wrestlers will return to the mats tomorrow morning for the semifinals as well as the final three rounds of wrestlebacks.

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