PORTLAND – There are a lot of things that Luke Ferschweiler doesn’t have.
The sophomore from West Salem High School didn’t have name recognition, an impressive resume in wrestling or a high ranking going to the OSAA Class 6A state wrestling tournament.
What he does have after Friday is a spot in the state semifinals.
West Salem’s Luke Ferschweiler is named the winner in the OSAA Wrestling State Championships Class 6A quarterfinals for weight 106 at the Memorial Coliseum in Portland on Friday, Feb. 24, 2017.
The complete unknown scored a major decision against Century High School junior Tanner Morris, then won a 10-7 decision against David Douglas High School junior Max Hodge in the quarterfinals to move on to Saturday’s 9:45 a.m. 6A 106 pound semifinal round to face No. 3 seeded Tristin David of Roseburg.
“Our thing is now, every match before he goes out there, no matter who you’re wrestling, what happens, if you get put in a bad situation, you let your wrestling do the work and that’s it,” West Salem coach Mikey Baker said.
“He’s took that into his wrestling style. He doesn’t come out nervous anymore. He’s going to come out and do his thing. Right now he’s an unknown so he can play that card.”
Ferschweiler was a reluctant recruit to wrestling from West Salem’s cross country team as a freshman.
After a rough first year in the sport where he didn’t place at the district tournament, he had to be talked into coming back for another year of wrestling.
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And now he’s 26-5 on the season with Friday’s wins.
“I just was telling myself the whole time I got to win this for my team because it would be really cool to have somebody coming back, bringing back something, top six or what do you know top one,” Ferschweiler said of earning a state meet medal.
“That’s pretty cool. I guess it’s the whole fact that I’m just trying to prove to my team and my family that I’m more than a nobody.”
In his quarterfinal match against Hodge – the No. 6 ranked wrestler in the state – Ferschweiler earned a quick 4-0 lead in the first period, but up 5-2 in the third period he was called for stalling.
He reacted to that.
Ferschweiler immediately scored on a near fall and then a takedown.
“The whole stalling call thing, that made me really angry because I didn’t think I was stalling,” Ferschweiler said. “I had the leg and I was trying to work for something.
“When the refs told me I was stalling, that kind of set off an anger in me. That made me more just eager to take him down more. That helped a lot.”
After Friday’s semifinal round, Sprague stood second in the team standings with 122.5 points and Roseburg led the team scores with 210.
Sprague’s Dane McKinney, facing, competes against West Linn’s Taran Floyd in the OSAA Wrestling State Championships Class 6A quarterfinals for weight 160 at the Memorial Coliseum in Portland on Friday, Feb. 24, 2017.
Sprague has six wrestlers still in the quarterfinal round: Freshman Bollong Joklur (106), sophomore Daniel McClung (126), junior Michael Murphy (138), senior Spencer Nofziger (170), freshman Santos Cantu III (195) and senior Tanner Sorensen (220).
North Salem sophomore Ian Carlos reached the quarterfinals at 145 pounds and McNary sophomore Enrique Vincent did the same at 120.
After the first day, Dallas was fourth in the 5A team standings with 64.5 points and has four wrestlers in the quarterfinals, Jacob Jones (126), Tanner Earhart (160), Clay Coxen (182) and Treve Earhart (195).
In the 4A meet, North Marion senior Lane Stigall pinned his two opponents to advance to the semifinals in his quest to win his third straight state championship.
Technically, Scio junior Ryan Mask was an underdog for the Class 3A state wrestling tournament.
Coming into the tournament unseeded after losing a 12-4 major decision in the finals of last week’s Special District 2 tournament to Creswell’s Blake Nelson.
But he demonstrated a major flaw in that logic Friday.
Scio’s Ryan Mask is named the winner in the OSAA Wrestling State Championships Class 3A quarterfinals for weight 220 at the Memorial Coliseum in Portland on Friday, Feb. 24, 2017.
Mask pulled off an upset by winning a 6-5 decision against No. 2 seed Chase Onstot of Willamina in Friday’s quarterfinal round of the 220 pound weight class and demonstrated why he was ranked No. 4 in the state this season.
“I don’t really get intimidated by other people,” Mask said. “I just go out and wrestle my match and it is what it is at the end of the match.”
Mask trailed Onstot for most of the match and was down 5-4 with just over a minute left in the final period.
He knew the urgency of the situation, shot in, scored a takedown with 42 seconds left and held on for the decision to move on.
“I got to get a takedown,” Mask said. “We’re both on our feet and the only way to win is to take him down. You just got to score more points than him. One more point will win a match.”
Mask wrestles Glide sophomore Zack Welker, the No. 3 seeded sophomore from Glide, in Saturday’s semifinal round.
But Mask doesn’t consider himself an underdog for that match, just as he doesn’t consider himself an underdog for any match.
“I don’t think so, not people that know me,” he said.
Dayton led the team standings after Friday’s quarterfinal round, and senior Jared Henry, a state champion as a freshman and a No. 1 seed, advanced convincingly to the semifinal round.
Willamina had two No. 1 seeds advance to the semifinals, Jordan Reyes and Chandler Allen, and is No. 2 in the team standings.
bpoehler@StatesmanJournal.com or Twitter.com/bpoehler