Mar. 16—TULSA — Daton Fix wasn’t about to end his 100th victory at Oklahoma State stuck in the defensive position.

The Cowboy senior from Sand Springs — 10 minutes from the BOK Center where the first day of the NCAA wrestling championships were held Thursday — found himself underneath Northern Iowa’s Kyle Biscoglia in the closing minute of his second round match after a late takedown. He was already holding a two-point lead and just needed to avoid being turned to secure the win.

But as the seconds ticked down, Fix slipped out the backside and pulled out a reversal to finish his match on top with an 8-4 decision.

“I don’t want to end matches like that, so I got that reverse,” Fix said. “The crowd gets a little bit excited, and you definitely want to find a way to get out and end that match on top.”

With the victory, not only did Fix advance to Friday morning’s championship quarterfinals, but he became the 45th Cowboy to achieve 100 wins in his career.

And while it’s a significant career milestone, the three-time national runnerup is looking beyond this one.

“It’s awesome — 100 wins isn’t easy to do,” Fix said. “It’s a big accomplishment, but I’m more worried about these next three matches than I am the last 100.”

“He’s a winner,” Smith said of Fix’s achievement.

Fix won’t be the only Cowboy competing in Friday morning’s quarterfinals.

Fellow All-American Dustin Plott avenged a loss from earlier in the season in his second-round match against Oregon State’s Aaron Olmos — who bested the Cowboy in the road dual by 9-4 decision that was Plott’s first loss of the year.

Olmos did manage to get ahead in this match, as well, but Plott flipped the script to mount a 10-6 decision to remain in the championship bracket.

“I knew he was dangerous with space, so I didn’t walk into shots like I did last time,” Plott said.

Though Fix and Plott are now just one win away in the championship bracket from automatically earning All-American honors once again, both have loftier goals than that heading into the second day.

“It doesn’t mean a lot,” Plott said. “I was All-American last year. I’ve come to win it all.”

Two of the early tournament departures for Oklahoma State were impacted by injuries.

Reece Witcraft, who lost his opening match by 32-second fall against No. 2 seed Pat Glory of Princeton, had to take an injury default in his first consolation match of 125 pounds after entering concussion protocol. Carter Young, who suffered a knee injury in the Big 12 Conference tournament, managed just one point in his two matches. After losing his match in the 141-pound consolations by 4-1 decision, he was spotted in the tunnels of the arena noticeably limping.

“He was literally off 10 days, the first time he was on the mat was actually the day before the tournament started just to see what he could do,” Smith said of Young. “We were still debating what to do, but glad he did compete. Obviously that injury is going to take some time to heal, but I liked for him to see what he can do.”

Heavyweight Konner Doucet also was two-and-out in his first national tournament.

Still alive in the consolation brackets of their respective weights are Victor Voinovich (149), Kaden Gfeller (157), Wyatt Sheets (165), Travis Wittlake (184) and Luke Surber (197). Gfeller, Wittlake and Surber managed first-round wins before losing in the second round to higher seeded opponents.

Friday’s action was set to start at 11 a.m., with another round of consolations, as well as the championship quarterfinals.

“We got to push forward, we got to come to compete (Friday) — throw out the rankings,” Smith said. “We’re in the consolations and it’s a dog fight. We’ve gotta show up and be competitive.”