Durango High School will be well represented when the wrestling state championships get underway Thursday at Ball Arena in Denver.
The boys wrestling team and the girls wrestling team are each sending four wrestlers to state. To qualify for state, each wrestler had to finish in the top four of their weight division during the regional tournament.
“It was probably some of the best wrestling I've seen our club do all season,” Durango boys wrestling head coach Jason Silva said. “They were in a really, really tough region and they all had to beat people that they were not supposed to beat to make it in. I always talk about getting that signature win and a few of the kids got those this weekend. Some of them didn't, unfortunately. Some of them took fifth place because they lost last second in a little scramble. Overall, it was a great tournament.”
At 120 pounds, Ryan Dugan won the first-place match over Broomfield’s Cody Tanner. Dugan improved to 49-3 on the year and will be the No. 1 seed in the 120-pound class 4A state bracket. This is his third time qualifying for state.
“He's positioned in the bracket to be able to do some special things,” Silva said about Dugan.
Riley Belt qualified for state for the third time at 138 pounds after he finished third at regionals. He has a 33-11 record.
Both Cole Pontine (150 pounds) and Braxton Waddell (165 pounds) qualified for state for the first time. Pontine, who finished fourth at regionals, has a 20-10 record. Waddell, who finished second at regionals, has a 34-15 record heading into state.
“Braxton and Cole are the ones who performed better than they have all year long,” Silva said. “Cole has been battling injuries his whole career but he came into the season with a broken collarbone and he wasn't able to compete until after Christmas and he was having some issues there. But he turned it on and wrestled a great tournament. Braxton, he cut from 175 to 165 for the regional tournament, and we didn't know if it'd be a good or a bad thing and he made it all the way through to the finals.”
Durango finished eighth overall out of 14 teams in its region.
Silva said the wrestlers who qualified have stayed up in Denver to train, which is a nice bonus because they don’t have to go back and forth between Durango and Denver.
On the girls side, the Demons had three girls who finished second at regionals in their weight class. Hana Maletich (27-10) finished second in the 110-pound division. Brooke Fenberg (34-7) finished second at 115 pounds, while Marie Baker (29-15) finished fourth in the 120-pound division. Lillian Fenberg (20-12) finished second in the 130-pound division.
This is Brooke Fenberg’s second trip to the state tournament. Durango girls wrestling head coach Kyle Hanson said he was very proud of the way Brooke Fenberg has led the team and has set a tone for what the culture should be.
Hanson said he’s very proud of his group because there’s been a lot of overlaps in weight this year. It’s an advantage because the girls can practice against each other, but it got challenging when there was only room for one wrestler at each weight class. He credited Maletich with cutting weight down to 110 pounds in a healthy way. It gave the Demons room to have a 115-pound wrestler.
What’s unique about girls wrestling is it’s classless because of how new the sport is. So a 106-pound wrestler from a 1A school could wrestle against a 106-pound wrestler from a 6A school.
“One of the neat things that people will remember like these girls will tell stories about how it was an all-class tournament when they wrestled,” Hanson said. “Someday, hopefully there's enough competitors that we can split it up. But especially through the weights that these girls are wrestling like 105 through 130 has a lot of returning state champions. It's a packed area, but it makes sense, right? On average, this is the weight of athletic girls who decided to wrestle in the state of Colorado. But absolutely, there's something to be said that there's only four regions in the entire state. So if you're one of the 16 that makes it to the tournament, it's a big accomplishment for sure. So I'm really proud of them.”
bkelly@durangoherald.com
