Colton Schilling won a national championship in Greco-Roman wrestling at the ASICS Open Wrestling Championships held last week in Las Vegas.
That came after his younger brother Tyler took third in Greco and fifth in freestyle at the Junior Western Regionals.
Wrestling at 63 kilograms (138.75 pounds), Colton Schilling defeated both his early opponents by 8-0 technical falls to make the final against Blake Clevenger of Kearney, Mo. He beat Clevenger 9-6 for the title.
“I just wanted to go in there and get All-American,” Schiling said. “I expect to win every match, but after the semis match, I thought, ‘Well, I might as well go win a title.’”
The junior national championships are for wrestlers ages 17 to 20. Top finishers in the event are considered prospects for future world championships and Olympic teams and by virtue of his win and All-American status, Schilling goes in as the No. 1 seed in the U.S. Greco World Team Trials in the FILA Junior Division on June 13 in Daytona, Fla., with a trip to the world junior championships in Croatia on the line.
TYLER SCHILLING and the referee look toward judges for confirmation of a fall.
“I want to go win that,” Schilling said.
Schilling also competed in the freestyle championships on Friday, but fell in the second round to Joe Moita of New York Athletic Club, whom he had beaten by technical fall in the Greco semis, then lost his next match in the consolation bracket and was eliminated.
He said he’s always liked Greco wrestling, in which contestants are limited to holds above the waist, with a resulting emphasis on throws.
“I’ve always been good at it, but I guess I just got a little bit better at it,” he said.
Schilling is a freshman at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, where he redshirted this year. He said he’s not sure at what weight he’ll wrestle next fall, but he’s thinking it may be 141 pounds.
“I’m shooting for a spot in the line-up,” he said.
Tyler Schilling finished third in Greco at last week’s USA Wrestling West Regional at 120 pounds and then finished fifth in the freestyle competition after judges erred in the match that would have put him in the consolation final. The fifth-place match was Schilling’s 15th in two days.
Those finishes, though, qualify him for the national championships in Fargo, N.D. in July.