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Show . T-birds enter 17 team Wrestling Tournament at Albuquerque , By Jim Bayly I Instead of opponents getting easier they get tougher for ; Southern Utah State wrestling squad. This week the T-Birds head for Albuquerque, New Mexico, and the ninth annual University of New Mexico Invitational. In-vitational. Action gets underway Friday at 9 a.m. in Johnson Gym and will continue through Saturday. Seventeen teams are entered in the competition with such standouts as Adams State (ranked number one in NAIA), Arizona State (ranked number six in NCAA), University of Arizona, Boise State, Brigham Young University (MIWA champs and ranked fifteenth in NCAA), Central Oklahoma (ranked number nine in NAIA), Fort Lewis, New Mexico Highlands, Mesa College, Northern Arizona, Northern Colorado, University of Nevada Las Vegas, Utah State , University of Utah, Western State, host New Mexico, and SUSC. Last week the T-Birds found the grappling not too much to their liking at the Biola Invitational. In-vitational. SUSC could only manage six victories and five and one-half points. San Jose State (83) won the tournament with UCLA (82' 4) second. SUSC could only manage six victories and five and one-half points. San Jose State (83) won the tournament with UCLA (82'4) second. John Marshall 126 had two wins after losing his opening match to Rudy Geuvara of San Jose State, by a fall in 4:35. Marshall came back to beat Mike Stasser of Fresno State, 8-3, and Matt Peterson ofCal Lutheran, 9-5, 9-5, before losing to Larry Moore of Northridge, 10-1, in the consolation con-solation semifinals. Jim Tripp (118), Chris Hardy (177), and Dave Moat (167) had the T-Birds' other victories. Moat defeated Bruce Baron of Northridge, 8-1, then won by default over number two seeded Tim Morin of Long Beach State, before losing to Robert Parker of Fresno State and Bob Thomas of Biola. Tripp lost to Arturo Tafoya of Long Beach State then defeated Takafumi Hamabata of Cal Poly-Pomona, Poly-Pomona, 8-3, before bowing to Frank Clementi of UC-Santa Barbara, 7-3. Chris Hardy (177), wresting for only the second time this season, opened up with a wild 20-17 decision over Stan Whitlow of San Jose State but then lost to top seeded John Leifer of Fullerton State and Jim Blagg of Biola. Next action for- the T-Birds will be the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Championships Cham-pionships to be held at Western State, Saturday, Feb. 26. |