Checotah had four wrestlers qualify for the OSSAA state wrestling tournament starting Thursday Feb. 22-24.
Punching their ticket to state are two-time returning state champion Colt Collett 126 lbs, Cy Hunt 138 lbs, Mitchell Tanner 144, Reighn Westbrook 215 lbs. As a team Checotah finished 7th out of 32 teams on the 3A east regional held in Vinita.
Collett got upset in the finals by another returning state champion number two seed Zane Donely 6-5.
Cy Hunt won in sudden Victory 5-4 to clinch his ticket to state by defeating Taylor Nelson from Morrison.
Mitchell tanner defeated Cameron Bowman 9-6 from Kiefer an opponent who has defeated Tanner during the season.
Reign Westbrook lost by fall in his consolation finals match.
“I’m really happy for Cy, Tanner, and Roman Reighn. They all had to beat some good kids. They all had to stay the course of all the highs and lows a season can bring and that makes me proud for them to accomplish this goal.
Overall our team had a lackluster quarter- final round with only Collett and Westbrook advancing to the semi-finals. It made our guys really fight on the consolation side and crazy things usually happen.”
“Jaydon Casey and Keith McGuire both have state tournament experience. Both were both upset in the quarters and things didn’t go their way on the consolation side. Keith was up big near the end of his match and left his head in bad position and got pinned. Casey got rolled thru to his back getting pinned as well eliminating them from the tournament,” Checotah head coach Bret Oleson said.
Bobcat Phillips made the 5th place match and wrestled well. Phillips got out of position and lost his match making him an alternate for state.
“It’s tough when you have two seniors who are both really good wrestlers, great teammates, hard workers, part of your family, and they don’t achieve their goals. My heart broke for both boys and I’m at a loss for words.
Collett didn’t wrestle his best. He let the Vinita wrestler dictate the match and kind of took Colt out of his game plan. Colt and I watched his match saw the adjustments we need to make and will be ready Saturday night during the state finals,” Oleson said.
