BY GEORGE ALMASI Times Record Staff
THE EASTERN MAINE CLASS A wrestling regional was held Saturday at Mt. Ararat High School.
The high school wrestling regionals were held on Saturday with the top four grapplers in each region advancing to next weekend’s state championships.
The Eastern Maine Class A meet was held at Mt. Ararat High School and won by KVAC champion Skowhegan with 180.50 points.
Cony (144) was second, followed by Nokomis (97.50), Oxford Hills (84), Mt. Blue (70), Windham (68), Mt. Ararat (63.5), Westbrook (58), Edward Little (40), Hampden (19), Brunswick (17), Gorham (16) and Brewer (0,).
Freshman Robert Hetherman continued his strong showings with a first at 152 via a 16-0 technical fall decision over Eric Cash of Windham.
The Eagles also had four others advance to the state meet. Brandon Jusseaume took third at 182 with a pin (0:56) over Mike Williams of Edward Little. Also, Adam Ewing was fourth at 145, John Hetherman fourth at 160, and Pierce Knorr fourth at 285.
"I was hoping a couple of more kids might’ve snuck in," said Mt. Ararat coach Erick Jensen. "But, those guys who were seeded fourth or higher made it in so it wasn’t a bad day. As for Robert, he’s won a lot of tournaments and he’s just been wrestling tremendously."
Jensen’s son Christian, a Brunswick freshman, lost to nemesis Cody Craig of Skowhegan, 5-1, in the 106- pound championships finals.
"He’s getting closer (to Craig) and they’ll probably meet again next week," said Erick Jensen, "But, of course, they have to beat some pretty good wrestlers to get there."
Skowhegan crowned seven individual champions Saturday to cruise to their second straight Eastern Maine Class A wrestling title.
Skowhegan will send nine wrestlers to states after dominating the lower and middle weight classes. The Indians won four of the first five championship matches contested and secured all of their individual titles at 182 pounds or less.
Regional champions for Skowhegan were Craig (106 pounds), Tyler Craig (120), Luke Bolster (126), Julian Sirois (132), Kaleb Brown (145), Logan Stevens (160) and Mikal Federici (182).
The Class A championships, are set to be held next Saturday at Noble High School in North Berwick.
Western Class B
Morse competed in the Western Maine Class B Championships at Winslow High School.
Mountain Valley took first with 152 points, followed by Wells (128), Fryeburg Academy (121.50), Erskine Academy (94), York (90), Mt. View (71), Winslow (70), Gardiner (62), Morse (48.50), Oak Hill (36) and Lincoln Academy (3).
Morse’s Hunter Reed decisioned Andrew Boisvert of York 3-1 to lay claim to the 152-pound weight class.
Also, Raz Baltazar took second at 160 via a pin (4:17) loss to Zach Isbell of Erskine.
Also advancing to state competition was Corey Lent, who took fourth at 170 with a pin (2:50) to Jacob Spofford of Wells.
"They wrestled very well," said Morse coach Shawn Guest. "Hunter and Raz wrestled very smart - they were Tom Bennett trained - to make it to the finals. Corey ran into a couple of studs, but managed to make it back to states this year after missing out last year. We will be prepping for states this coming week and hopefully we will have a state champ or two."
The State Class B meet is set to be hosted by Morse and held at the Bath Middle School gym next Saturday.
Class C wrestlers held a round-robin event at Bucksport with the top wrestlers advancing to Mountain Valley next Saturday.
