Titans Survive Surprises District’S Upsets Don’T Slow U-Hi

Replay: From Sports, February 7, 2000, page C2: Three Frontier League regional qualifiers were inadvertently omitted from Sunday’s story when two weight classes from the 3A sub-regional wrestling tournament were not transmitted from Sunnyside. Colville’s Chase Gotham won the 119-pound weight class and teammate Josh Struck finished second at 125 pounds. Placing third at 119 was Cheney’s Kayle Gray. Cheney has eight regional qualifiers and Colville six. A total of 25 Frontier wrestlers will participate this weekend in Ellensburg against wrestlers from the Olympic and Pierce County leagues for four spots in each weight class to Mat Classic, Feb. 18-19 in Tacoma.

(From Replay, February 8, 2000): Nick Portrey, at 152 pounds, won a district wrestling championship for Ritzville. His name was inadvertently omitted from Sunday’s tournament story.

Prep wrestling

One wrestler didn’t know until a couple weeks ago he’d be able to compete in the District 8 4A tournament, let alone in the finals. Another surprised everyone, including himself, by reaching the title match.

Neither Lewis and Clark’s Brian Greene nor University’s Andrew Smith were champions, but their efforts were part of the unpredictability of postseason competition.

Most every top seed won a title, but there were those valiant battlers who overachieved to move on and those who didn’t meet expectations.

Greene, a regional qualifier last year, had petitioned for a hardship year of competition because he had left school for a year and a half with personal problems while in Pasco.

It wasn’t until the next-to-last week of the GSL season that he was cleared to compete and when he lost to Rogers’ Zak Depue for the 160-pound title, he was wrestling for only the eighth time.

Included was a stunning 6-1 victory over defending district champion Ben Osborn of U-Hi in the semifinals.

Was he worried that he wouldn’t be cleared to compete?

“A lot,” said Greene. “But it worked out all right.”

Smith was barely a .500 wrestler for the Titans until his breakthrough weekend at 140 pounds. He beat third-seeded Kyle Bush of Central Valley and second-seeded Jason Neumiller of North Central for a date with top-seed Daryl Gardner of Ferris, who dealt him an 8-1 loss in the finals.

“It actually feels good, whether I won or not,” said Smith. “I’ve been working hard all year, but things just started to click.”

Smith’s trip to the finals was one of seven for league champion University which added a district title with 258.5 points and sends 10 wrestlers to regionals.

Teammate Ryan Montang stunned Gonzaga Prep’s once-beaten state-placer Jeff Zappone 5-3 at 103 pounds by scoring four points in the last 47 seconds.

Todd Slatter at 119 pounds and two-time state champion Tommy Owen at 125 were the other Titans champions.

“Overall I think it was a great team effort,” said U-Hi coach Don Owen.

“To have 14 in the top six is pretty good. I’d never guessed we’d have this kind of tournament, to be honest.”

East Valley, which finished third with 229 points, had a tourney-high five champions among six finalists.

Knights top seeds John Sommer, Mike Devenere, Dave Musser and Isaiah Hankel won, all handily but Musser, who held off NC buzzsaw Mario Montague, 6-4.

Bryan Lopes, fifth-seeded at 171 pounds, added the other title, also easily, 9-2 over Rogers’ John Smith. On the way he decisioned top-seed Ryan Van Doren of Mead 17-9.

And teammate Josh Birt continued to give Gonzaga Prep’s Travis Pascoe all he could handle, the two-time state champion hanging on at the end for a 9-6 189-pound title decision.

The Knights have eight regional qualifiers. The runner-up Bullpups, who scored 235.5, have nine, including 135-pound champion Greg Healy who reversed an earlier loss to U-Hi’s Magellan Laurich.

“I just stayed basic and didn’t flop to my back like in the U-Hi match,” said Healy.

Also winning district titles were Ferris’ once-beaten Aaron Sedler at 215 pounds and Mead’s Mike Schneider at 275, both with quick pins.

Unlike Greene and Smith, they finished as expected.

District 5/7 3A

What the Frontier League lacked in size it made up for with numbers in the District 5/7 3A regional tournament.

Three of the top four teams came from the Frontier, Clarkston beating Cheney 227 to 208.5 with Colville fourth at 186.0.

The four-team Frontier advanced 22 of 56 qualifiers to next weekend’s regional meet in Ellensburg.

Included among Clarkston’s nine-wrestler contingent were champions Alex Marks, 130 pounds, Anthony Johnson in an all-Clarkston 135-pound final with Nate Barham, and Matt Phillips, 140. Dustin Blankenship placed second at 152 pounds.

Cheney’s David Courchaine, 145 pounds and Blake Falor, 275 were other Frontier champions. Blackhawks Paul Kimball, 103, Ryan Gray, 130, and Steve Rasmussen, 140, placed second. The team qualified a total of seven to regionals.

Also making the finals were Colville’s Chris Lowry at 160 pounds, one of four Indians to advance.

West Valley’s Adam Aldendorf was second at 215 pounds and Anthony Hernandez third at 152.

District 7 A/B

Ritzville wrestlers won three of six finals matches while winning the District 7 A/B tournament.

The Broncos scored 276.5 points, ahead of second-place Kettle Falls (254) for the district crown.

The top seven finishers in each weight class qualified for next weekend’s regional tournament in Moses Lake.

Ritzville champions were Dustin Breazeale at 135 pounds, Drew Markum at 145 and Drew Markum at 145.

All told, the Broncos advanced a total of 14 wrestlers to regionals.

Freeman and Almira/Coulee-Hartline had two champions each.

Breazeale, Freeman’s Josh Newton, ACH’s Craig Winona and Rosalia’s Christ Thoreson repeated district crowns.

Freeman’s Matt Reeves, 140 and ACH’s Jason Thomas were their team’s other winners.

Two other defending champions, Chris Fulkerson of Freeman and Justin Ziebell of Ritzville finished second, behind Breazeale and Winona respectively.

Kettle Falls, with 15 qualifiers, and Freeman, with 11, joined Ritzville as tournament leaders.