ROCHESTER HILLS — Unlike basketball, where many teams like to schedule cupcakes in the opening weeks of the season, many high school wrestling coaches opt to schedule tough opponents to start the season as a way to gage their talent.

Hartland learned Wednesday at Rochester that the Eagles might be better than advertised.

Despite bringing back just five starters from last year's Final Four squad, Hartland coach Todd Cheney had his team answer many questions in gaining a pair of non-league wins over teams expected to be in the top tier of their respective conferences.

The Eagles (2-0) opened the night with an impressive 52-19 trouncing of New Baltimore Anchor Bay, and were equally impressive in downing Rochester, 53-17.

Rochester also defeated Port Huron Northern 40-25 in its first match, while Port Huron Northern also got the best of Anchor Bay with a 54-22 decision.

"We came in with a lot of unanswered question marks tonight," said Cheney, whose team has reached at least the Division 1 quarterfinals every season dating back to 2002 and finished as the state runner-up four times in that span. "We (graduated) some tough kids. We are young. We wrestled five freshman tonight."

One could not tell.

Against Rochester in the nightcap, Hartland came up with a couple of upsets and took advantage of the host Falcons, who were missing three key starters.

The biggest upset came from freshman prospect Austin Eicher, who stunned Rochester's Josh Wood with a pin in 5:42 at 112. Wood was the state runner-up at 103 last season.

"That was a nice surprise. I thought our freshman did a nice job and (Eicher's) win was nice to see. He beat a very good wrestler," praised Cheney.

Rochester (1-1) had to shuffle around most of its lineup, with state qualifier Diego Camp, Trevor Elliott and Jack Glancy out of the lineup with injuries. The Falcons were able to get by Port Huron Northern without a full roster, but fell behind Hartland in a flash and could never recover.

"We were missing three starters. I think if we had everybody here, it might have been different," offered Rochester coach Frank Lafferty. "I am not saying that we would have won. But it would have been closer. I had to bump up a bunch of kids and with three guys out, I had to wrestle a lot of sophomores and freshmen."

Justin Charneski (171) won with a major decision and Matt Ostermiller followed with a pin as Hartland led 10-0 early on against Rochester. Nick Long (215) followed with a pin to bump up the lead to 16-0.

Rochester responded when Marcel Johnson (285) gained a pin and Justin Kim (103) followed with a major decision to climb back to within 16-10.

That was as close as Rochester would get.

Eicher added six more points with his upset of Wood, which set off a 34-3 run to put the match out of reach.

Brian Tilley (135), Mitch Thomas (140) and Chase Snider (145) all won by pin, John Julien added a victory by technical fall and Keith Boldt (119) and Justin Rollins (130) both added wins by major decision for Hartland.

Snider recorded his 149^th and 150^th career wins on the night.

"It doesn't get any easier for us. We head to Lake Orion Saturday for a tournament and there will be a lot of good teams there," said Cheney. "We beat some good teams here tonight. I know they were (both) missing some guys. But this is a good way to start the season. I didn't know what to expect."

Rochester's Kaelen Richards (125, decision) and Cody Devoe (160, major decision) accounted for the Falcons' other points.

"When we have everybody healthy, we'll be tough," said Lafferty. "It's a long season. This loss means nothing right now."

Hartland pins down Anchor Bay

It took Hartland less than an hour to topple Anchor Bay in its opening match, as the Eagles overcame an early 6-0 deficit with eight straight wins which accounted for 41 straight points.

Charneski (171), Ostermiller (189), Nate Hughes (103), Eicher (112), Ross Kantola (125), Snider (145) and Julien (152) all won by pin. Long (215) and Brian Braun (285) won by decision and Boldt won by void for the Eagles.

Anchor Bay, which had four starters out of the lineup for various reasons, could only muster a match-opening pin from Mitch Bourgier (160), a major decision from Eric Rybarz (130), a pin from Zach Morrisette and a decision from Larry Rybarz.