On January 12th the Jaguar wrestling team placed third in the state duels. The Jags lost in the semifinals to Allen then beat Morton Ranch High School in the consolation finals to take third place.
“In the State duel there are no individual awards,” said wrestling coach Steve Davis. “The whole team wins or the whole team loses; we compete like football, basketball, and baseball.”
Wrestling has two different state championships. The first is the Texas State Duel meet championship, which is a team event. Then there is the UIL state championship that wrestlers qualify for individually. The Jags have three defending champions, seniors Dillon Akers, Scott Akers, and Drake Dudley.
“If we have a wildly fantastic season, it is likely that only seven or eight of our very best athletes will be good enough to compete at this event,” Davis said
In the State Duel, coaches select 14 wrestlers to compete in the 14 different weight classes against the opposing team’s wrestlers and at the end of the meet the winning team moves on to the next round.
“I rotated my line-up based on the strengths and weaknesses of our opponents to get the best match-ups possible to try to win each dual,” said Davis. “Each athlete that competed contributed equally, from my most inexperienced freshman to our senior State Champions, Dillon Akers, Scott Akers, and Drake Dudley.”
In the first round the Jags defeated San Antonio Churchill and moved on to the second round, where they dominated El Paso Deville, 54-19. In the third round, the Jags went toe- to- toe with Katy Klein High School and defeated them to move on to the semifinals, where they lost to defending state champions, Allen.
“If I had to pick a MVP for our team at this event, it would be Dylan Akers at 126 lbs,” Davis said. “Dylan won all five of his competitions scoring 27 team points on the day.”
The UIL State Championship Regional Tournament, to be held at Coppell High School on February 1, is approaching quickly. In order to qualify, wrestlers must be in the top four of their weight class at the District event then they must advance to Regionals, where the top four in each weight class advance to the State Championship Tournament. At the state championship, 14 state champions are crowned in each weight class.
