Orange High wins Eagle Invitational wrestling title

 You’d have to take Orange High School 145-pounder Anderson Pope at his word that he felt sluggish on the mat from a post-illness recuperation. To the untrained eye, he appeared to be a pin-happy Panther all the way to the championship of the two-day 25th annual Eagle Invitational wrestling tournament that concluded Saturday.
After cruising to the finals with three falls in an average time of three minutes each, Pope collided with a bruiser in Leesville Road’s Matt Cesari, squeaking out a 4-2 decision for the individual title, and helping Orange to the team title..
“He was a tough kid. He was strong. A lot of things could have went different,” Pope said of his tilt with Cesari.
“I was just feeling a little sluggish from my sickness this week, but I still had to do what I had to do for my team, and I guess wrestling for my team helps me to have motivation to keep going when I’m down or not feeling good,” Pope said.
Orange placed 13 of its 14 wrestlers in the top six places of their weight classes in the 22-team tournament hosted by Eastern Alamance to win the championship.
Pope was one of three titlists for Orange, which sent six wrestlers into the finals. Other champs were Jack Twomey-Kozak at 138 and Byron Stephenson at 285. Finishing second were Gonzalo Garcia at 113, David Peters-Logue at 160, and Argie Burnette at 220.
Placing third were Collin Smith (126) and Jack LeMaster (170); at fourth were Jared Flynn (120) and Melik Jimenez (152). Joe Scott (106) and Brock Wilson (195) placed fifth, while Michael Proctor came in sixth at 132.
Also in the Top 10 team standings were Jordan, fifth with a titlist in 120-pounder Spencer Service, a runner-up in Courtland Parker at 285 and five place finishers overall (138-pounder Allal Kartaoui at fifth, and 113-pounder Brok Oakley at 113 and 126-pounder Robbie Tomasic at sixth); East Chapel Hill was eighth with a pair of second place finishers in Armond Berry at 182 and Masai White at 195 and four place finishers overall (Tyler Shull, third at 160, and Ballard Robinette, sixth at 120); and South Granville was ninth with a runner-up in Brandon Meeks at 106 and one other place finisher (Brysen Thorpe, fourth at 160).
Other local teams competing were Granville Central, which had a champion in 152-pounder Nathan Bizzell and three placers overall (Arie Freeman, fourth at 126, and Nelson Gregorio, fifth at 170); N.C. School of Science & Mathematics with three place winners (Henry Seiler at 145 and Benson Robles at 182, fourth, and fifth-place winner Morgan Howell at 152); and Cedar Ridge with two place winners (Adam Howard, third at 152, and Brendan Way, sixth at 145).
Although he placed fifth at 138 in the 3-A state championships last season and entered the weekend with a spotless 11-0 record, Pope came to the Eagle Invitational as second seed at his weight class behind a beefed-up Seiler, who won the 1A state championship at 113 last year.
But he was taking it all in stride, and not letting his unblemished record go to his head.
“There’s actually a scripture that I think about before all my matches. It’s Proverbs 27:1: ‘Don’t boast about tomorrow for you don’t know what the day will bring,’” he said. “I can’t say I’m going to win this match because anything is possible.”
As an example, he noted that Orange is coming off a humbling — and extraordinarily rare — experience last weekend after a 60-9 thumping by Fayetteville Jack Britt.
“We look at it as a building block. Wrestling Jack Britt we see all our weaknesses, where we need to build as a team and where we need to build individual character,” Pope said. Winning the Eagle Invitational team title helped take some of that sting off, he said.
Southern Alamance 132-pounder Jake DeAngelo was named Most Outstanding Wrestler for the tournament for the second year in a row. He became the tournament’s first four-time champion, doing it in a weight class packed with six returning state qualifiers. They included his finals opponent, Austin Jamison of Northwest Guilford, who won the 4-A state crown at 120 last year, when DeAngelo placed third.
At 106, C.J. Kimmerly of Leesville Road picked up an 18-3 technical fall over Meeks, piling up his points in balanced fashion on takedowns, reversals and near falls. Chance Davis of Apex switched from a single- to double-leg takedown to take a first period lead over Garcia at 113, then got a third period reversal before Garcia got an escape to finish the scoring at 4-1 in Davis’s favor.
Service won a nail-biter over Tristan Dean of Northwest Guilford, 4-2, at 120. After a scoreless first period, Service locked up a near-side cradle for three back points against Dean, a 4A state runner-up at 113 last year, to go ahead in the second period.
Service chose neutral for the final period, but Dean got a fireman’s carry takedown against him to pull within a point. Dean let Service up for an escape, hoping to get a takedown that would send the match into overtime, but the Jordan grappler fended off a flurry of single-leg attempts to carve out the 4-2 win.
“This is my fourth year starting so top has been my best thing and I’ve been really working on grinding it out and locking up my cradle, and that was it,” Service said.
“This is my first tournament that I’ve won. I was pretty proud of myself,” he said. “This was a tough weight class. I beat the state runner-up in the semifinals (James Daggett of Chatham Central at 106) so I had some tough kids in my weight and I’m glad I pulled it out.”
At 126 Alexander Preudhomme of Bishop McGuinness, a 126-pound 1-A runner-up in 2012, beat Jordan Decosse of Southern Nash 4-1. A highly anticipated rematch against Jordan’s Robbie Tomasic was scrapped after Tomasic fell ill in the semifinal round. The Jordan wrestler beat Preudhomme last weekend in the Bull Durham Classic finals at Jordan
Twomey Kozak beat Blake Millaway of Northeast Guilford 4-0 at 138. He nailed a first-period takedown, kept Millaway flat to the mat in the second period, then broke free of Millaway’s leg ride and spun behind for a reversal in the third period.
Bizzell decked Jacoby Benjamin of Southern Nash to finish their 152-pound final.
“He was very, very strong, and he will do very well this season, but I was just more technical,” Bizzell said. The Granville Central wrestler was up 8-0 in the third period after getting his third takedown.
“He started to turn, I sunk the half deeper and I knew it was over, no need to rush anything,” Bizzell said. “I was expecting a small decision, maybe 3-2, 2-1. I wasn’t expecting to be up 8-0 with a pin.”
At 160, Peters-Logue fell behind in the first period after Ross Scott of Western Alamance caught him in a standing cradle for a four-point move. Scott hit a duck-under for another takedown in the second period before Peters-Logue escaped and got a takedown. But the Orange wrestler couldn’t turn Scott in the final period, losing 6-3 despite Scott being warned for stalling.
Jacob Scarlett of Eastern Alamance defeated Jon Smith of Northwest Guilford 12-2 at 170, before Berry fell to Jackson Tucker of Leesville Road at 182. The East Chapel Hill wrestler went up 5-2 in the second period with three back points off a reverse half, but Tucker escaped, took him down and pinned him with an underhook and reverse half.
East Chapel Hill teammate White dropped a 9-0 major decision to Cary Miller of Northwest Guilford at 195. At 220 Burnette got slapped with a vicious headlock and clamped by Devontea Walker of Cummings in the second period. The Orange wrestler was winning 4-3 at the time.
Parker lost to Stephenson at 285 on a 2-1 sudden-death overtime decision. After tying 1-1 in regulation, neither wrestler scored in overtime. They then went to sudden death, where the bottom wrestler must score or the offensive wrestler on top gets the win. The Orange wrestler held Parker to the mat to come away with the win.
25th annual Eagle Invitational
Team Scores—1. Orange 273; 2. Northwest Guilford 180; 3. Leesville Road 156.5; 4. Southern Alamance 150.5; 5. Jordan 118; 6. Southern Nash 102.5; 7. Northeast Guilford 91.5; 8. East Chapel Hill 82.5; 9. South Granville 82; 10. Chatham Central 81; 11. Cummings 77; 12. Apex 74.5; 13. Granville Central 74; 14. NC School of Math and Science 67.5; 15. Eastern Alamance 65; 16. Western Alamance 64.5; 17. Graham 64; 18. Bishop McGuinness 62; 19. Cedar Ridge 47; 20. East Wake 46; 21. South Lenoir 35; 22. Walter Williams 14.
Championship Round
106—C.J. Kimmerly (LR) tech fall. Brandon Meeks (SG) 18-3. 113—Chance Davis (Apex) d. Gonzab Garcia (OR) 4-1. 120—Spencer Service (Jordan) d. Tristan Dean (NWG) 4-2. 126—Alexander Preudhomme (McG) d. Jordan Decosse (SN) 4-1. 132 –Jake DeAngelo (SA) d. Austin Jamison (NWG) 3-0. 138—Jack Twomey Kozak (OR) d. Blake Millaway (NEG) 4-0. 145—Anderson Pope (OR) d. Matt Cesari (LR) 4-2. 152—Nathan Bizzell (GC) p. Jacoby Benjamin (SN) 5:47. 160—Ross Scott (WA) d. David Peters-Logue (OR) 6-. 170—Jacob Scarlett (EA) maj. dec. Jon Smith (NWG) 14-2. 182—Jackson Tucker (LR) p. Armond Berry (ECH) 3:10. 195—Cary Miller (NWG) maj. dec. Masai White (ECH) 9-0. 220—Devontea Walker (CU) p. Argie Burnette (OR) 3:44. 285—Byron Stephenson (OR) d. Courtland Parker (JO) 2-1 OT criteria.
Consolation Round
(3rd/4th Places)
106—Caison Scott (SA) d. Josh Hedrick (NWG) 5-4. 113—Austin Comeford (NWG) d. Zac Ragan (WA) 4-0 120—James Daggett (CC) maj. dec. Jared Flynn (OR) 8-0. 126—Collin Smith (OR) d. Arie Freeman (GC) 4-1. 132—Patrick Brown (NEG) d. Chris Jaeger (CC) 10-7. 138—Evan Arredondo (AP) d. Nick Trego (McG) 8-4. 145—Tyler Ceperano (SA) maj. dec. Henry Seiler (NCSSM) 12-3. 152—Adam Howard (CR) d. Melik Jimenez (OR) 3-2 160—Tyler Shull (ECH) d. Brysen Thorpe (SG) 12-9. 170—Jack LeMaster (OR) d. Nick Owens (SN) 2-1. 182—Anthony Poppo (NWG) d. Benson Robles (NCS) 5-1. 195—Chris Long (SA) d. Zarek Stafford (LR) 7-0 220—Terrance Reed (GR) p. Alex Pineda (SA) 2:22. 285—Chris Pendergraft (LR) p. Dadrian Saunders (EA) 2:32.
Consolation Round
(5th/6th Places)
 106—Joe Scott (OR) tech. fall Dakota Medina (SN) 15-0. 113—Zach Jones (LR) p. Brok Oakley (JO) 4:54 120—Mark Crider (AP) d. Ballard Robinett (ECH) 4-3. 126—Jake McClellan (NWG) forfeit Robbie Tomasic (JO). 132—Jake Villabona (SL) d. Michael Proctor (OR) 3-2. 138—Allal Kartaoui (JO) DQ Ozzy Palacios (SN). 145—Daniel Krakowski (AP) d. Brendan Way (CR) 3-2. 152—Tyler Ruff (LR) p. Morgan Howell (NCSSM) 4:49 160—Austin Greeson (SA) d. Ethan Mason (CC) 1-0 170—Nelson Gregorio (GC) p. Adam Lane (CU) 0:47. 182—Seth Elkins (CC) forfeit Elijah Whitsett (GR). 195—Brock Wilson (OR) p. Sterling Wilder (EW) 1:37 220—Cameron Cox (NEG) p. Trevor Craft (EW) 2:27. 285—Ricardo Guerrero (CU) p. Blaine Partin (GR) 4:00.  .