FARMINGTON • It was a historic day for the Hillsboro wrestling team at the Class 3 District 1 tournament at the Farmington Civic Center on Saturday.
The Hawks had two individual champions—Jarad Sheppard (195 pounds) and Josh Mayberry (220)—and racked up 167.5 points, making them the area's top team and second overall. They qualified 10 wrestlers to next week's state tournament in Columbia, breaking the previous school record of six.
"I'm overwhelmed," Hillsboro coach Dave Peirce said. "The kids produced. They bought into the team concept, and if there were any jitters, you couldn't tell."
Sheppard won a close battle with Rockwood Summit's Rudy May, resisting a last second scramble to hold on to a 2-1 decision.
"I was just hoping we wouldn't get the take down on me," Sheppard said. "My adrenaline was definitely going."
Mayberry won his match on a tech fall after Summit's George Matthews injured his elbow 15 seconds into the second period. Matthews was unable to continue.
"I went to switch out and when I kicked my leg out, he yelped and walked away," Mayberry said.
Peirce said Sheppard and Mayberry stuck to their game plans.
"Both of them wrestled two tough kids from Rockwood Summit, who we saw earlier," Peirce said. "They executed perfectly and wrestled well."
Farmington ran away with the team district title, amassing 266.5 points. The Knights had six district champions and sent 12 total to state.
Summit came in third with 161.5 points and qualified seven, including three individual champions: Aaden Aaden (113), Mitch Mays (152) and Kris Bolton (285). But that success was tempered by Matthews' injury.
"We knew coming in that he was one tweak away from really being injured," Summit coach Brent Batchellor said. "Whether or not we can patch him up for next week remains to be seen."
Aaden's match was an entertaining, back-and-forth contest. After taking a seemingly comfortable 8-4 lead in the second period against North County's Garret Arnold, Aaden suddenly found himself on his back with his shoulder close to the mat for the pin.
"He had me on my back, and I heard my coach yelling short time," Aaden said. "I knew I couldn't let it end right there."
Aaden managed to keep the shoulder up and was saved by the bell.
After surrendering another point early in the third, Aaden went on the offensive. He jumped ahead 11-10 on a take down and went on to a 15-11 win.
"I was just thinking about getting small points at a time," Aaden said. "I wasn't going to try and do something big. I had to stay positive and keep wrestling."
"He was able to come out of the scrambles and managed to come out on top," Batchellor said. "That's a good win for him."
Other area individual champions included Washington's Cole Hamai (132) and Pacific's Austin Repp (145).
