SHOSHONI/RIVERTON — The Punchers had a great week of wrestling at Regionals in Shoshoni for the boys and Riverton for the girls.

The girls did very well in their wrestling and showed improvements on the year. I was pleased with how well they competed. We had some issues with nerves and that is expected when going to a regional tournament for the first time. Three Lady Punchers qualified for State. Charlie Smith placed fourth, the other two qualifiers are Kristine Young and Kamia Runyan. Morgan Brown went 2-2 on the day in the largest weight bracket and just missed out on State. 

The boys in Shoshoni placed third as a team, just missing out on second place by 20 points. We just needed a couple of matches to go the other way for us and we would have been right there with them.

I was happy with how well we competed in our matches and how well we did on the day of the tournament. Big Piney High School qualified 13 wrestlers for state. We were hoping to get a couple more but just missed on those other three from qualifying. 

Caleb Brown and David Farrington were regional champions and had a great day of wrestling. Caleb did a great job of attacking his opponents in each of his matches. David was able to control the pace in his matches that helped lead to some key wins. The Punchers had three more athletes in the finals as well. Dominic Sanchez probably had the best tournament on the team. He lost out on the finals by 1 point on a close call. We look to improve on that outcome this next week at state. Jackie Meador had one heck of a scrambling match in his final but lost out and placed second. Zavier Clifford made the finals and competed very well against a two time state champion. I loved how he did not back down from him and went after him. Caden Clifford lost early but came all the way back to earn third place, going 5-1 on the day. Zach Murphy and Zef Zuniga also wrestled well to place fourth. Rodger Young went 3-2 on the day to qualify for State, Judah Farrington, Nate Brown and Jarret Fear also qualified for State. 

There are a few things that we need to work on this week and as a staff we have a lot of work to do on the scouting front to prepare our athletes. 

Overall, I was pleased with our performance and am looking forward to this year’s State championships. 

It will be a new experience for us in that it is for the first time we will wrestle at a three day meet. Both boys and girls will wrestle at the same time and we are looking forward to the challenge. 
State starts on Thursday at noon and will end on Saturday at 5 p.m.