Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Wrestling Backlog

Somewhere in the whirlwind of preparing for the Holidays, I did not post the results from the Gryphon's trip to Greenville last week. The wrestling team competed in the Milt Sherman Duels at Conley High School last Saturday.

Originally, this was the last competition Rocky Mount had on the schedule before the Christmas break. The Gryphons faced some tough competition in a gymnasium filled with some of the best 3A teams in the East. "There's a lot of competition here," Francisco Alfaro said at one point. "I mean a lot. This is like being at Regionals."

Rocky Mount came out with 2 wins in their 3 matches.

The Gryphons gave up 24 forfeit points to White Oak in their opening match and fell 30-45. Holding a 30-15 advantage at one point, the team lost a close decision at heavyweight before giving up 4 straight matches by forfeit.

Rocky Mount went up against host D H Conley in their second match and won handily, 48-21. Aside from the forfeits, the Gryphs only gave up 9 points on the mat.

In the evening's last match, the Gryphons out wrestled the Cardinals from Jacksonville High, winning 42-33. The match saw the Gryphs get out to a 30-0 lead by winning the first 5 matches by pin, only to see the Cardinals come back to tie it at 33-all. A Chandler Phillips win and Johnny Stewart pin in the last two matches clinched the win.

Stewart, Dedrick Silver, Daryl Cross and Guy Williamson won 3 matches each. Alfaro, Phillips and Justin Atkinson took 2 apiece, while Demonte Hill, Kinston Peters and J K Williamson each notched one.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Why so many forfeits? Does RM not ahve any wrestlers to compete in these weight classes?

Anonymous said...

Greg, the Gryphs don't seem to have a 103 or 119 pound wrestler, so that probably explains those two forfeits. Don't know what happened to Robert Barnes - he was our 103.
Forfeits in other matches on different days could include wrestlers that are sick, didn't make weight, discipline, or around the holidays out of town.
Scott and Phillips missed some time for whatever reason. And the football playing wrestlers were still playing football at the start of the season.
Nick has also said that coach forfeited a few matches because they were far enough ahead at the time. It wouldn't surprise me if some of the freshman guys were held out because they would have been up against a really good guy. I have seen opposing coaches not send out a wrestler against a few of our really good guys. I'm guessing it's because his kid wasn't experienced enough.
But it looks and sounds like the team is doing OK.
Go check them out on the 10th at Northern. I hope they sweep again.