“Coach (Willie Wineberg) usually gives us five minutes to get over a loss,” Fayette said. “It took me about a half hour. It was a heartbreaker so I took my time.”
Fayette rebounded well as he ran off five straight wins to finish third. During the run, he eliminated Fairmont’s Jake Sage, bumped Springboro’s Tyler Riegle into the seventh-place match and avenged his first-round defeat.
“Coach told me anyone can win when they are up in the championship,” Fayette said. “It takes a real man to come back through consolation. One of the things about the state tournament is that anyone can lose at any time. There are upsets. It is when people recover that you see how they really are.”
The trip through the consolation was Fayette’s first at the state tournament.
He was briefly in the consolations as a freshman before finishing second as a sophomore and winning it his junior year.
“This was about as sweet (as winning it),” Fayette said. “I’m disappointed, but this was a great experience. I’ve never been in the consies like this.
“It was a great experience and a nice way to finish out my high school career.”
Bounce-back day: The tough round to bounce back from is the loss in the semis. Not only had a trip to the finals been within their grasp, but wrestlers have to turn around and wrestle two quick matches Saturday morning.
Seven Miami Valley wrestlers ran that gauntlet Saturday. They came out with four third-place finishers, two fourths and one sixth.
“The coaches have taught us to leave everything on the mat because you can’t change what happened,” Versailles’ Thomas Fullenkamp said after finishing third at 152 in D-III. “I have had my fair share of losses. It sucks, but there is nothing you can do about it.”
Franklin’s Eric Hildenbrand admitted that it was tough, but better than the alternative.
“It’s tough, but it’s something you got to do,” Hildenbrand said after losing late in the semis before coming back to finish third at 160 pounds. “Mentally, it is hard losing a match like that because you are so close to the finals.”
Valley View 189-pounder David Day opted to use the close loss in the semis to fuel his run to a third-place finish.
“I hate losing more than anything in the world,” Day said. “It sticks with me.
“I had bigger hopes. I wanted to place as high as I could, but I kept thinking about it.”
Underdog to medalist: Beavercreek junior Josh Stevens entered as the third-place finisher from district and exited the state tournament with a third-place finish at 125.
“I love being the underdog,” Stevens said. “No one expected anything from me.
“It’s what you do at the end of the year. That’s all that matters.”
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