Eight wrestling teams will be at Knoxville today starting at noon participating in the class 3A wrestling District. Knoxville Coach Eric Whitcome knows his team is a long shot to win the district title…however Knoxville has seen nearly every team in this year’s district either in a dual or in a tournament. Whitcome says with the competition his team has wrestled they are prepared for the district. Pella is also involved in the class 3A district meet. Pella coach Joe Burch says they know with a young team it will be tough overall today, but they do have high hopes for Brent Smith and A.J. Arendahl, both who have previous state tournament experience. Smith qualified for state as a freshman but hasn’t been back since after finishing third in the districts the past two years. He’ll be up a weight class at 140 today after wrestlig 135 all season. Arendahl placed 5th at last year’s state tournament at 171. This year he’s up a weight class at 189 and will have some stiff competition in that bracket today but Burch is confident he can come away in the top two. Pleasantville has five wrestlers competing in a Class 1A District meet today and PCM also has five wrestlers competing in a Class 2A District meet today at Chariton. The District meet starts at noon today and the top two finishers in each weight class advance to next week’s State Wrestling Tournament at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines which gets underway Wednesday.

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