| A Carbon wrestler dominates his foe during the Region 8 wrestling meet. |
The Carbon High wrestling team has had a great year this year and it has now been near topped off by having eight grapplers from the team qualify for the state meet at Utah Valley State College this weekend.
“I’m proud of this team,” said Carbon wrestling coach Dave Smith on the phone Wednesday morning. “This is a good group of kids and they have worked hard. We’ve been pretty strict with them, and at times we have had to administer some discipline, but they have done well.”
The 3A classification has been the strongest group of schools in the wrestling category for years. Wrestlers from this classification consistently beat the top 4A and 5A wrestlers in the state.
Last week Region 8 held it’s region meet at Lehi High School and Carbon qualified eight wrestlers for the state tournament.
“We’re looking forward to this,” said Smith. “It’s what we work for all year. And many of these kids do work at this all year.”
Out of the eight qualifiers, four of the athletes were proclaimed Region 8 champs at the meet.
In the 119 lb. classification Trent Greenhalgh defeated Bryce Phillips of Lehi to take their final bout and won the individual region crown for that division.
At 135 lbs. Dustin Howa defeated Tyler Christensen of North Sanpete for the title in that weight division.
In the 140 lb. division Zack Burdick took the championship in his category by beating Cody Maxfield of Delta.
The final region champ from Carbon was Dallen McFarlane who at 145 lbs. beat Derrick Anderson of Delta.
Two Carbon wrestlers took second in their weight divisions. The first was Courtney Ivory in the 125 lb. class who was defeated in the championship round by Rod Seiger of Lehi.
Another was Ryan Leonard in the 275 lb. division who lost to Kevin Bean of North Sanpete.
All wrestlers who take up to fourth place in the region qualify for state. Carbon has two more who fall into the category, with Nick Nielson at 130 lbs. beating Cameron Macnary of Lehi for third in his weight class and Patrick Strey in the 125 lb. division taking fourth when he lost to Ricky Hatch of Delta.
Smith said this has been a great group of seniors and he looks for good things this weekend at the state meet.