In its Pac-12 home opener Sunday night, ASU wrestling fell to Boise State 22-21 via tiebreaker criteria.
The Sun Devils lost their the first three matches of the night, two of them via pin fall.
The first match was a slugfest between redshirt sophomore Oliver Pierce and Boise State redshirt senior Chris Castillo.
After that, sophomore Jacen Petersen was pinned in the first round by Boise State redshirt senior Taylor West, putting the Broncos up 9-0.
Freshman Zachary Smith didn’t have much better luck – he was also pinned by redshirt junior Austin Dewey in the first round, putting the Sun Devils in a 15-0 deficit.
Redshirt senior Blake Stauffer faced a tough task in bringing his team back, and he delivered with a significant win.
“The pressure is there but ultimately I wanted to get six points for the team,” Stauffer said. “I wanted to get the fall but, that’s always the goal, get the most amount of points possible.”
Stauffer crushed redshirt freshman Keavon Buckley 15-0, earning a technical fall and getting the Sun Devils on the scoreboard 15-5.
Redshirt senior Josh DaSilveira also recorded a pin fall victory, beating redshirt freshman Chili Sabin to narrow Boise State's lead to 15-11.
Freshman Tanner Hall followed with a win over redshirt sophomore Gaylen Edmo brought the Sun Devils within one and gave ASU a surge of momentum.
Trailing 21-14, sophomore Robbie Mathers topped redshirt sophomore Jake Velarde 13-5 and rallied to get back within striking distance at 21-18.
In the most eventful match of the night, senior Matt Kraus and sophomore Geordan Martinez battled through a triple overtime bout, and Kraus squeaked out a narrow win.
“I think that’s something that comes from the practice room,” Kraus said. “What we work on and putting ourselves in tough situations, we had a day of practice that was specially design to put us in in a tough situation and I think it comes from that.”
The score was 21-21 and due to tiebreaker rules, the Sun Devils lost to the Broncos by one point.
Head coach Zeke Jones said he was disappointed by the team's slow start.
“I think the back half of the dual responded well when we got in that tight spot early," Jone said. "The guys coming back at the end were great, but we can’t continue to start off the way were starting off, we can’t put ourselves in a hole and then dig ourselves out every time and we need to start fast and finish strong.”
The Sun Devils will compete in the Las Vegas Invite at on Friday, Dec. 4 and Saturday Dec. 5.
Reach the reporter at osoussi@asu.edu or follow @omarksoussi on Twitter.
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