La Plata’s Owen Butler controls the action during his 152-pound bout with Glenelg’s Jacob Szczepanski as part of the Warriors’ Class 2A state duals semifinal showdown with Glenelg on Saturday at North Point High School. Butler pinned his opponent, but La Plata lost to the Gladiators 36-30.
La Plata’s Jason Mohler works to secure the pin in his 160-pound match during the Warriors’ Class 2A state dual semifinal with Glenelg on Saturday afternoon at North Point High School. Mohler did secure the fall, but the Warriors fell to Glenelg 36-30.
La Plata’s Owen Butler controls the action during his 152-pound bout with Glenelg’s Jacob Szczepanski as part of the Warriors’ Class 2A state duals semifinal showdown with Glenelg on Saturday at North Point High School. Butler pinned his opponent, but La Plata lost to the Gladiators 36-30.
Staff photo by ANDY STATES
La Plata’s Jason Mohler works to secure the pin in his 160-pound match during the Warriors’ Class 2A state dual semifinal with Glenelg on Saturday afternoon at North Point High School. Mohler did secure the fall, but the Warriors fell to Glenelg 36-30.
For four years, Jason Mohler and his La Plata teammates worked to get the Warriors wrestling program back into the territory it long enjoyed as one of the more prominent teams in the state.
On Saturday, the Warriors were back on the state stage competing in the state duals at North Point High School for the first time since 2011. The stay was short-lived, as La Plata lost to Glenelg 36-30 in the Class 2A semifinals, but it did little to take away from what the team had accomplished in overcoming a slew of injuries to earn the long-awaited return to the state duals stage.
“It’s been a real long road, took all four years to get here for me and the rest of my buddies,” said Mohler, who won his match at 160 pounds by fall in the first period. “We’ve worked our [tails] off to get here. We’ve done everything right, all did extra work, extra practices, everything.
“Yeah, it sucks to come up short, but to not be here the last three years and then rally a bunch of young guys together and get them to put everything they have into the sport and then come here all together and put in a good performance, not an embarrassing performance, but a good performance as a team, it felt good.”
La Plata (14-1) found itself in a quick hole against its Howard County opponent, as Glenelg (14-2) took the opening bout at 106 by forfeit and then got a pin from David Ridenour at 113 and a Jaeson Hibbitts’ decision at 120 to open up a 15-0 edge.
Koda DeAtley won by first-period fall at 126 to get the Warriors on the board, but the Gladiators’ Ethan Sotka (132) and Kevin Yang (145) followed with wins in two of the next three bouts — the former by major decision and the latter with a late comeback for a critical decision — to extend the margin to 22-9 halfway through the dual as Tyler Plourde was also a La Plata winner with a decision victory at 138.
Owen Butler (152) and Mohler each delivered first-period pins for the Warriors to pull the team to within 22-21, but Ethan Mackey (170), Nicholas Kingsbury (182) and Drew Sotka (195) delivered three straight wins for the Gladiators to seal their spot in the finals.
Nate Lednum (220) and Wayne Johnson (285) closed out the match with consecutive victories for the Warriors.
The result was right in line with what La Plata head coach John Pankhurst expected, just not with the desired outcome.
“The difference was we didn’t finish as strong as we started in a couple of weights, and we gave up a couple of key bonus points in a couple of situations,” he said. “It was kind of a tough situation. I think some of the kids might have been a little bit nervous in the moment, and then others were maybe trying to do a little too much.
“Working it out in my head, like 100 times, I had it in the 30s and within one match. Even coming up on the wrong side of it that’s exactly what it turned out to be. It was pretty close to what I thought it was going to be, I just needed a couple more things to go our way. You have to credit [Glenelg]. They finished strong.”
Glenelg later lost to Stephen Decatur of Worcester County 42-24 in the 2A final. All four of this year’s state dual champions were repeat winners, with Decatur claiming the 2A crown a year after winning the 3A title. Southern of Garrett County won its third straight 1A title, with a 56-21 victory against Baltimore’s Dunbar.
Damascus, last year’s 2A champion, defeated Manchester Valley of Carroll County 42-26 in the 3A final, marking the eighth straight year the Hornets from Montgomery County have won a state dual championship. Springbrook, of Montgomery County, also repeated as the 4A champion, defeating Annapolis 40-29 for the crown.
For La Plata, while the ultimate goal was to win the program’s first state duals title since the program claimed its third in 2011, returning to that stage and competing wasn’t without at least some satisfaction.
“This is disappointing, but it’s not like we got run out of the gym,” Pankhurst said. “It was a competitive match and it was a one-match swing right down to it. Thinking about the year overall, though, we’ve had share of adversity the last couple years and we maybe handled it better this year from the experience of dealing with it the last couple years. It’s still very exciting for the boys to get through the SMAC unscathed and to be able to come here and have this opportunity.”
There is still ample opportunity ahead, as well, as the team will now focus on this weekend’s SMAC tournament, which La Plata hosts.
“All I know is there is a lot of work to do from here on out,” Mohler said. “We have a lot of things to do right now. But the most important thing is just to get back in the room and crank it up a notch.”
