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Donny Herrington had the start and Adam Salyers covered the finish, but the middle matches belonged to No. 28 Mount Union as the Purple Raiders pinned Wilmington, 31-9, in an Ohio Athletic Conference dual meet at Fred Raizk Arena Wednesday night.

The loss drops the Quakers to 1-4 in the OAC, 1-10 overall. Mount Union improves to 4-1 in the conference, 9-3 for the season.

“From 125 to heavyweight, I’d say Mount Union is one of the best teams we’ve seen. They are just solid all the way through,” Wilmington head coach Mark Lane said.

Herrington (Cincinnati/Sycamore) raised his OAC record to 5-0 with a medical forfeit victory over Riki Reynolds at 125 pounds when Reynolds was injured in a scoreless first period and could not continue.

“That was unfortunate. Reynolds is a really good wrestler. We were looking forward to seeing him. It’s been a while since Donny has been pushed in the conference, so we again have question marks without wrestling that match,” Lane said.

The next eight matches were all Mount Union as the Raiders methodically rolled through the weight classes.

“I thought we wrestled in our middle weights just to keep the match close, which is kind of disappointing,” Lane said. “I’d rather see a more attacking style.”

Salyers (Mechanicsburg) halted the Raiders’ run by grinding his way to a 4-3 win over Derrick Hesson at 285 pounds. Salyers closed out the win by riding out the entire third period. The win was Salyers’ 10th straight and moved the junior heavyweight to 5-0 in the conference, 16-2 overall. It also avenged a 3-1 double-overtime loss to Hesson at the Florida Citrus Open on Dec. 30.

“Adam didn’t need to be reminded about the importance of that match,” Lane said. “He and Hesson are the two guys in this conference, and they are going to keep butting heads. It’s always going to be a good match when they come up against each other.”

The Quakers will close out the OAC dual season at Muskingum on Feb. 9.