Deer Park captures fifth straight State 2A wrestling crown

TACOMA – Matt Jorgensen and his Deer Park Stags will enjoy the school’s fifth straight State 2A wrestling championship for all of four days. Come Wednesday evening, Jorgensen and the Stags begin work toward a sixth consecutive title. “It will come to an end sometime, but it ain’t yet,” said Jorgensen, whose team had to turn away a challenge Saturday from Centralia as Mat Classic XXIV concluded at the Tacoma Dome. Deer Park ended with 154 points, 20 ahead of Centralia. East Valley took eighth (54). Jorgensen’s team matched the second-longest string of state titles (Moses Lake) and is one away from tying Sedro Woolley, which took six straight from 2002 to 2007. Deer Park brought nine to state and all nine took home medals. Jake Konzal (120 pounds) and Cole Harris (126) captured state titles while Joe Grable (138) and CJ Rodriguez (220) each finished second. “We had a goal when we first started as a coaching staff that in four years we wanted to win a state title,” Jorgensen said. “We did it at the four-year mark. It just kept building.” Jorgensen never tires of hoisting state title banners. “This is better than Christmas,” Jorgensen said. Konzal, third last year after capturing a state title as a freshman, got things started nicely in the finals, posting a pin in 1:37. “I’ve wrestled him a lot before so I knew what to do,” Konzal said. “I used a dump. I’ve been using it all my life.” Moments later, Harris scored an 11-2 major decision. “We’ve won a bigger margin in other years and as a team we’ve had more titlists (six one year),” Jorgensen said. “But this weekend was the toughest competition we’ve had in Centralia. They wrestled hard. To bring nine and place nine is amazing. All of them were in the top six.” What makes Jorgensen hopeful that the streak will continue is the four finalists return. “We’ve got a good group of kids who are willing to work hard,” Jorgensen said. The Great Northern League had three other finalists – Braydan Berezay of EV (152), Brock Beeler of Clarkston (170) and Cameron Schlotter of Cheney (195) – who were runners-up. 1A Orting ran away with the team title (166). Colville tied for fifth (86) and Riverside (76) was eighth. The Northeast A had three state champs. Riverside had two and Lakeside (Nine Mile) had one. Kit Major of Riverside pinned Matt McCallum of Kiona-Benton in 5:06 at 132. Chase Fuson of Lakeside edged Alex Myrick of Royal 3-2 at 160. Dewey Bender of Riverside finished undefeated, scoring a sudden victory 4-3 victory in triple overtime over John White of Ridgefield. 2B/1B Warden captured the team title with 143.5 points, 24 ahead of Reardan. Reardan had two state champs. Nathan Sorci of Reardan pinned Ernesto Orozco of Warden in 3:03 at 132 and Niko Knezovich, also of Reardan, topped Jerry Reyes of Warden 9-1 at 182. Other area champs were Kyle Kirkendall of Republic at 145 and Jesse Billups of Almira/Coulee-Hartline at 285.