Area Wrestlers Set To Open Action At State Tournament

Posted: February 19, 2016
By ROBERT NIEDZWIECKI
The Winchester Star

State wrestling tournament action begins today at the Salem Civic Center, and numerous local wrestlers will be looking to bring home some significant hardware.

Groups 1A through 4A will all be in Salem today and Saturday. Today features quarterfinal action at 10 a.m. and the semifinals at 6 p.m.

Saturday will start with consolation matches at 9 a.m. and conclude with the championship finals at 2:30 p.m.

Clarke County is pursuing its second consecutive team state championship in Group 2A. The Eagles — who scored 121 points to Grundy’s 118.5 last year — won the 2A East Region tournament by 20.5 points on Saturday at Wilson Memorial High School and qualified nine wrestlers for the state tournament.

Handley (four), James Wood (three), Sherando (two) and Millbrook (one) qualified a combined 10 wrestlers for the Group 4A tournament, and after winning regional titles, three of those 10 hope to win the second state title of their high school careers.

Clarke County is led by two-time state champion Bayne Gordon (49-5), a junior who is competing at 126 pounds, and sophomore Bryan Wallace, who is going for his second straight state title, this time at 195 pounds. Wallace is 43-0 and has won 28 straight matches by pin (not including injury defaults or forfeits). Wallace has 35 pins overall to rank second in the area.

Gordon (13-4 major decision) and Wallace (31-second pin) each won their regional titles on Saturday handily. The 2A West Region champion at 126 pounds is Grundy’s Wesley Belcher (a 7-4 regional final winner over Marion’s Skylar Trivette) and Graham’s Alex Hicks at 195 pounds (a 4-3 regional final winner over Grundy’s Cullen Nash-Cleek).

Gordon, who has not lost to an in-state wrestler in Group 2A, said Belcher wrestled JV last year behind the person Gordon beat 6-0 in last year’s 120-pound state final, while Clarke County coach Jon VanSice said Wallace has not faced Hicks.

Clarke County’s other two regional champions are senior Brendan Ciaburri (33-9) at 132 pounds and sophomore 152-pounder William Heath (33-4). Ciaburri — who defeated Madison County’s Jalyn Simms 3-1 in his regional final — could have to contend with Grundy’s Maverick Coleman, the 2A West champion. Coleman won the 2A state title at 126 pounds last year.

Grayson County’s William Lawrence is the West champion at pounds. Heath wrestled Lawrence at the Virginia Beach Nationals prior to the season in early November and lost 6-3, but that was four matches after Heath tore a ligament in his big toe and tore a tendon in the side of his foot. Despite the pain, Heath elected not to have his injury checked out until after that tournament, where he took fourth.

Though Heath’s injury prevented him from returning to action until the Walters/Copp tournament on Dec. 23-24 at James Wood, Heath said he used that time to his benefit.

“I couldn’t work with my lower body for a month, so during that time I worked the whole upper body,” Heath said. “My strength is helping me a lot.”

Though Grundy features 12 state qualifiers and nine regional champions, VanSice said his team could have a chance at the title if its top wrestlers perform the way they’re capable of. VanSice said there aren’t many weight classes in which the two schools’ top performers overlap.

“Our strength doesn’t really meet their strength anywhere, and [East runner-up] Strasburg’s strength doesn’t meet their strength anywhere,” VanSice said. “[Grundy] may have more strength in the wrestlebacks than we do, but I see a three-team race coming down to the finals, and anyone can win.”

Sherando junior John Borst, who has a record of 52-2 (tied for the area-lead in wins) and an area-best 42 pins, won the Group 4A state title at 170 pounds last year.

Borst’s only two defeats this year came at the Beast of the East tournament in Newark, Del., in December against people who went on to place first and third.

After pinning his way to the 4A West Region title, Borst said Saturday that he expects his main competition to be Hanover’s T.J. Allen, who won the 195-pound state title last year. Borst said the senior Allen has committed to Virginia Tech and has twice been an All-American at the Fargo (N.D.) Nationals.

Borst has not wrestled Allen in a match, but practiced with him last summer when both were at the Team Virginia at Virginia Tech to prepare for Fargo.

“He’s a great kid and was one of my best friends over the summer,” Borst said. “But once I step foot on the mat we’re not friends anymore. It’s time to go, and I’m going to win.”

Handley senior Lio Quezada (42-3 with 30 pins at 132 pounds) won a state title in 2014 at 120 pounds, and he has not lost to a Group 4A wrestler this year.

Quezada expects Hanover’s Tyler Flora (4A East champ) and Deep Creek’s Keith Trochelman (4A East runner-up) to be his main competition. Flora took sixth at 120 pounds in 2014 when Quezada won the state title at that weight, and Trochelman took eighth that year in that weight class. Quezada beat Trochelman 6-3 in the quarterfinals that year.

James Wood junior Aaron Black (50-4 with 27 pins at 113 pounds) figures his main competition will be Courtland’s D.J. Ahalt. Ahalt won the 4A East title last week and the 4A 106-pound state title in 2015. Black beat Ahalt 14-4 for the 4A North Region title at 106 pounds in 2014.

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