The Starr of the Red Cloud Wrestling Team

Morgan wrestling at the LNI championship. Photo courtesy of Clay Leonard. Copyright Red Cloud Indian School.

The Starr of the Red Cloud Wrestling Team

                                                      By Jin Yup Jung’ 14

It was a Saturday morning, snowy and windy. While people were getting cold, the weather did not affect one man from Red Cloud who won three matches in a row and made it to his first championship at the LAKOTA NATION INVITATIONAL (LNI) on December 21st.    

Senior leader Morgan Starr gave everything he had at LNI and made Coach Clay Leonard and his teammates very proud. Starr wrestled at 145 lbs and finished his first and second matches by pins in the first period. He won his semi-final by points, 16-5. “I was aiming for 3rd, so I did not expect myself to reach the finals,” Starr said. “I was very happy and excited to wrestle in the championship.”

In the championship, Starr wrestled against Tanner Crissler from Turtle Mountain in North Dakota, who was named Most Outstanding Wrestler of the LNI tournament. Starr started stepping in his own wrestling move while circling around Crissler, and he was accepting the challenge as the whistle blew signaling the first period. He looked for Crissler’s weakness to shoot on. However, Crissler was a little bit faster and more experienced than Starr. As Crissler worked to get an advantage, he double-legged Starr swiftly and earned a pin after resistance from Starr.  Although Starr used all his strength while he was encountering Crissler on the mat, unfortunately he had to accept his loss.

On the other hand, Turtle Mountain ended up getting 10 champions out of 14 weight classes. They had several wrestlers highly rated in the state of North Dakota.

“I’m very satisfied coming in second,” Starr said. “And I plan on continuing to work hard and do as well as I did at other duals and tournaments.” 

Coach Leonard was satisfied as well that Starr worked hard and made it to his first championship. “Morgan’s wrestling at LNI was fabulous. He dominated first in his three matches. It was a great testament to the all the hard work that he put in during the off-season and beginning of this year to place second out of 11 wrestlers.” 

Leonard continued, “Though he was injured during the finals’ match, we were looking forward to Starr’s recovering and continuing his great leadership on the team.” 

“I did get injured,” Starr said. “But now I have been cleared to return.”

Red Cloud wrestlers have been practicing really hard. They competed in the Presho Tournament on Friday and Saturday, which was one of the biggest and toughest tournaments before the State Tournament.