{"id":8423,"date":"2026-01-28T19:24:58","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T19:24:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/?p=8423"},"modified":"2026-01-28T19:24:58","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T19:24:58","slug":"princeton-claims-first-conference-wrestling-championship-since-2011-shawlocal-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/?p=8423","title":{"rendered":"Princeton claims first conference wrestling championship since 2011 – shawlocal.com"},"content":{"rendered":"


The Princeton Tigers wrestling team defeated Rockridge and Sherrard on the Prouty Gym mats Friday, clinching its first conference championship in 14 years. <\/span>(Kevin Hieronymus)
PRINCETON \u2013 Fourteen years is a long time.
Most of the Princeton wrestlers were either in diapers or just coming out of them the last time the Tigers won a conference championship in 2011.
The Tigers<\/a> wrestling team put up a new marker on the Prouty Gym banner Friday, sweeping a pair of Three Rivers dual matches to claim the conference championship.
The Tigers first defeated Rockridge 40-35 and then took down Sherrard 58-21 to wrap up the Three Rivers championship.
It was Princeton\u2019s first conference title since 2011, in an abbreviated NCIC conference field, and their first in the Three Rivers. PHS also won the NCIC championship in 2007, its only other conference title.
\u201cIt means a lot. Looking up at that board, we last won it in 2011. This is the first time in the TRAC, That\u2019s sweet,\u201c said PHS senior Ace Christiansen, who was one of five Tigers to sweep two matches Friday.
\u201cWe knew they were pretty solid teams. They didn\u2019t have anybody over the top, but we knew they were going to be pretty tough. I think we did very well.\u201d
PHS junior Casey Etheridge, who took both of his matches moving up a weight to 175 pounds, was glad the Tigers could get what eluded them in football.
\u201cIt feels great to get a conference championship in wrestling because it\u2019s been that long. And in football, we didn\u2019t get it done, so it feels nice to get it in another sport,\u201d he said.
\u201cWe didn\u2019t wrestle our best against Rockridge, but I thought we wrestled better against Sherrard. Sherrard beat Rockridge and we wrestled real well against Sherrard.\u201d
Tiger coach Steve Amy knew he had the makings of a champion when they hit the mats this season bringing back four state medalists.
\u201cWe knew we had a pretty special group. As long as everyone fit in the right weights, we\u2019d be pretty good,\u201d he said. \u201cHats off to these guys. They\u2019ve worked hard all year and they deserve it and hopefully next week (at regional) they\u2019re ready to go.\u201d
Of the double winners on the night, Amy especially praised freshman Andrew Giaquinto for stepping in at 165 to fill in for Mike Kurth, who was ill.
He pinned Rockridge\u2019s Isaac Bull at 0:47 and Sherrard\u2019s Jaydon Wilson at 3:29.
\u201cHe did a great job filling. Had a guy sick, so we moved the lineup around a little bit and he came away with two wins. It was great,\u201d Amy said.
\u201cHe did a great job,\u201d Etheridge said. \u201cHe\u2019s been working really hard. He stepped up tonight and got both those pins.\u201d
Etheridge took care of business with two falls on the night, at 0:25 against Rockridge\u2019s Levi Junis and at 0:30 against Sherrard\u2019s Alexander Buckner.
Christiansen scored a 10-0 major decision over Rockridge\u2019s Thomas Sowards and an 18-2 technical fall over Sherrard\u2019s Andrew Knox.
Augustus Swanson scored two falls, at 0:27 over Rockridge\u2019s Cooper Larson and at 0:36 over Sherrard\u2019s Tavian Strauss.
Kane Dauber also went 2-0 with a forfeit against Rockridge and a 16-1 tech fall over Sherrard\u2019s Jacob Fratzke.
Jacob Paull (1:08) and Eli Berlin (0:54) both contributed falls against the Rockets at 113 pounds and 190, respectively.
Other PHS winners against Sherrard were Jaydon Cooke (126) by fall at 0:26, Brennen Emmett (157) by fall at 3:29 and Brayden Bickett (106), Corbin Brown (138) and Daniel Gilbertson (285) by forfeit
Amy doesn\u2019t want the Tigers to be satisfied as they gear up for the Class 1A St. Bede Regional next week.
\u201cThey had a good year, so far. Looking forward to adding to it at regional next week, hopefully,\u201d Amy said.
Kevin has been sports editor of the BCR since 1986 and is Sports Editor of Putnam County Record. Was previously sports editor of the St. Louis Daily News and a regular contributor for the St. Louis Cardinals Magazine. He is a member of the IBCA and Illinois Valley Hall of Fames. He is one of 4 sportswriters from his tiny hometown Atlanta, IL<\/p>\n

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The Princeton Tigers wrestling team defeated Rockridge and Sherrard on the Prouty Gym mats Friday, clinching its first conference championship in 14 years. (Kevin Hieronymus)PRINCETON \u2013 Fourteen years is a long time. Most of the Princeton wrestlers were either in diapers or just coming out of them the last time the Tigers won a conference championship in 2011.The Tigers wrestling<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8423\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/princetonillinois.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}