2024 Klein Collins Tiger Classic-Boys

On Friday and Saturday, Jan. 19-20^th, Klein Collins High School, a northern suburb of Houston held their 20^th annual Tiger Classic Wrestling tournament. This year’s version had 28 teams and over 300 boys participating. A majority of the teams represented the greater Houston area; stretching from League City to Conroe and Katy to Kingwood. Also participating was San Antonio Churchill and Austin Bowie, as well as an Oklahoma school, Southmoore HS. Southmoore is currently the #14 ranked 6A school in Oklahoma. Two preliminary rounds and a consolation round were held on Friday evening, with the remainder of the bouts taking place on Saturday.

With late season nicks and dings, as well as teams participating in the State Dual Championships, we saw some ranked wrestlers who normally might have participated in this tournament not take part. Nevertheless, there were still 45 ranked wrestlers taking the mat this weekend, and 21 in the Top Ten.  Opportunities to improve one’s ranking were there for the taking.

106lbs: The top four seeds were Early from Kingwood, Gomez from Humble, Nichols from Klein, and Quinn from Conroe Grand Oaks. All four made it to the Semifinals. Gomez was ranked above Nichols because of his winning percentage, while Nichols has had better tournament finishes. In their semi, Nichols got the win by fall over Gomez in 2:44, after leading 7-0 in the second period.  In the other Semi, Early got out with the lead as his name implies, with an 11-3 advantage over Quinn after two periods. Quinn on bottom, escaped after four seconds, and needed thirty more seconds for a takedown. Down 11-6, time was dwindling and would continue until it expired without any additional points. Early would face Nichols in the Finals.  

Unfortunately for Early, something happened to him in the semis, and he had to take a Medical Forfeit in the Finals. Kenneth Nichols of Klein is the 106 Champion. In the consolation final, Quinn would takedown Ian Calvillo in the waning moments of the first period and put him on his back for the pin at 0:44 for third place.

113 lbs: The wrestlers with the highest rankings, #14 Dedrick Collins of Conroe Oak Ridge (28-3) and #15 Curtis White (31-4) would meet in the Final match. In a very tight match, Collins, the number one seed would squeak out a 3-1 decision over White, the number two seed. This would be Collins’ third tournament championship of the season, to go along with his third place at the CFISD tourney. 

Third place was claimed by Jackson Ewing of Klein who decisioned Llyon Truong of Oklahoma Southmoore, 5-4. Ewing won the match with an escape in the third period with only ten seconds left.

120 lbs:  Brandon Carrillo of Klein, recently came back to wrestling this season during last weekend’s Chicken Wing Invite. And he did so with a splash, as the 2023 UIL sixth place 106 lb. wrestler won his weight class. The Tiger Classic would end up being his second championship in as many weeks. He would beat Coby Rankin of Langham Creek with a pin in 1:29, and win the Final match with a little more work, that being an 8-3 decision over Brett Johnson (32-7) of Kingwood, on the strength of a takedown and nearfall in the last 1:16 of the third period.

In the match for the bronze medal, Noah Reynolds of Oklahoma Southmoore HS pinned Jaydon Rodriguez of Cy Falls in 2:07. Reynolds holds the #9 6A wrestler ranking in Oklahoma….