ST. PAUL -- The Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City Falcons rolled into the semifinal round by beating up on New York Mills 33-24 in the Class A quarterfinals at the Xcel Energy Center on Thursday evening.
The Falcon (26-3) will take a 21-match winning streak into today's semifinal at noon. They'll face a very good Frazee line-up which eliminated two-time defending state champion Pierz 30-19. The Falcons are rated No. 4 in the Class A poll, Frazee (20-3) No. 3 and Pierz, which was missing their 130 pounder, came in rated No. 1.
ACGC jumped to a 13-0 lead and the Eagles (18-5) could never make up the difference. Jeremy Anderson started out with a pin at 103 for his 40th win this season. Ben Meyer at 112 was coming off his first loss, in the individual quarterfinals four hours earlier. He made a statement with a technical fall, which was followed by a 6-4 decision by Bill Wheeler.
The Eagles needed bonus points but got only four from one of their aces, Jared Hotakainen (22-3). John Hoeper wrestled a good match to hold the score down to 12-3.
The Eagles won two of the next three but barely cut into the ACGC lead which stood at 19-14 after the 145 pound match. Erick Larson won 6-3 over Luke Tervola (23-17) at 140.
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That brought up the core of the Falcons' state lineup and it produced big results: A.J. Frederiksen won a technical fall, Eric Peterson pinned his foe and unbeaten Nic Leither won a 9-4 decision for the decisive points and a 33-14 lead. New York Mills won the last three weights but it was too little too late.
ACGC is in its fourth state tournament in five years.
