TOKYO (October 18-19) – Takushoku University sent three wrestlers to the finals on the closing day of the collegiate greco-roman wrestling championships to overtake defending champion Nippon Sports Sciences University and Waseda for the team title.
Shun Kinoshita won the 96kg category while teammates Toru Yokosawa (84kg) and Kotaro Muraki (120kg) were runners-up as Takushoku came from 18 points down to claim its ninth overall collegiate greco-roman title. The Tokyo school won in 2010 but surrendered the crown to NSSU last year.
Takushoku finished the tourney with 54 points — 24 of them scored on the final day. NSSU slipped to second with 51.5 points after racking up 42 points in the first four weight categories.
Waseda, with two champions and two runners-up, had to settle for third place with 50 points at Komazawa Gymnasium.
Kinoshita, Takushoku's only champion in the tourney, was named the outstanding wrestler of the championships. Taichi Shajo, one of three champions crowned by NSSU on the opening day, was awarded the fighting spirit award.
Shota Tanokura (NSSU) was the only winner to repeat from last year, taking the 55kg crown with a five-point throw in the second period of his match with Yuki Uchiyama of Yamanashi Gakuin University.
Meanwhile, Kohei Kitamura, who won the five big high school titles as a second-year student in Saitama, won at 74kg for his first collegiate crown as a junior at Waseda.
Championship final results:
55kg – Shota Tanokura (NSSU) df. Yuki Uchiyama (YGU), 2-0 (5-2, 5-0=1:45)
60kg – Taichi Shajo (NSSU) df. Keisuke Ikeda (Wa), 2-0 (1-0, 3-0)
66kg – Hideyuki Otoizumi (NSSU) df. Kazuhiro Hanayama (Wa), 2-0 (1-0, 1-0)
74kg – Kohei Kitamura (Wa) df. Daisuke Shimada (Kokushikan), 2-1 (0-1, 2-0, 1-0)
84kg – Yuki Suzuki (YGU) df. Toru Yokosawa (Taku), 2-0 (2-0, 1-0)
96kg – Shun Kinoshita (Taku) df. Ki Akamine (Aoyama Gakuin), 2-0 (2-0, 1-0)
120kg – Shori Maekawa (Wa) df. Kotaro Muraki (Taku) by fall, 2P=0:59 (0-2, F5-0)
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