Call it the appetizer of a three-course meal, and all those participating in Saturday's Georgia Area 7-AAAA traditional wrestling tournament understand it's time to loosen the belt. There's plenty more to come, and a good bit of it might look awfully familiar.
Favorite Gilmer County won the area team title with 272 points, dominating with five individual champions, seven runners-up and two third-place finishers in getting each of its wrestlers into next week's sectional round. Northwest Whitfield will take 12 to the next round after posting two individual titles and five runner-up finishes in amassing 222.5 points.
Heritage was third with 147 points and two individual champs, followed by Cartersville (110.5), host Ridgeland (107.5) and LaFayette (100). The theme, according to coaches, is that many of Saturday's individual matchups will be seen again.
Northwest Whitfield's Bryon Gembe, right, wrestles Gilmer's Trevor Preece in their 113 lb championship bout of the Area 7-AAAA traditional wrestling tournament Saturday, Jan. 31, 2015, at Ridgeland High School in Rossville, Ga."I was surprised we got 12 in the finals and none of our 14 qualifiers is below third, so we won't have to wrestle any No. 1 seeds next week," said Gilmer coach Sam Snider, whose team won the state duals title two weeks ago. "I was very proud of that. This is the best region in 4A, and a lot of these kids that faced off in the finals today will do it again next weekend and maybe the weekend after that. We're going to face each other over and over -- that's what we do in this region."
Snider's six champions were Trevor Preece at 113 pounds, Alberto Perez at 126, Jaime Lopez at 152, Matthew Waddell at 170 and heavyweight Levi Seabolt. Northwest had champions in Austin Taylor at 160 and Jordan Pittman at 182, and one of the Bruins' second-place finishers was Blake Hayes at 126, who had to forfeit due to injury.
Regardless, Northwest coach Allen Tucker was thrilled to advance 12 wrestlers to the sectionals.
"I was hoping for 12, and that's what we got," he said. "It was a good tournament. Our kids are starting to get an edge to them. I guess they're tired of getting whipped by Gilmer, so we're getting closer. I wanted to see Blake Hayes get a chance to wrestle the Gilmer kid (Perez), but he tweaked his neck and I didn't want to take a chance in making it worse.
"We'll get some good seeds out of this, and we'll go down there and do it again next week. I guarantee you, it will look a lot like this. There will be a bunch of kids in this area in the final four."
Heritage, down to nine wrestlers Saturday due to two injuries and one who did not make weight, will take eight to the sectional round, including area champions Chuckie Thurman at 120 pounds and 195-pound Ahmad Salma, who easily was the surprise of the tournament. Salma upset top-seeded Jake Parker of Gilmer in the semifinals and won a 13-9 slugfest over Northwest's Jordan Lewis in the title bout.
"Ahmad is a strong kid who is really starting to come into his own," Heritage coach Mike Craft said of the junior from Israel. "We had a good tournament considering we lost three wrestlers in one day."
Ridgeland also had a pair of champions in Caleb Mariakis at 138 pounds and Chris Henderson at 220, while Southeast Whitfield had two champions in Tyler Brown at 145 and Omar Ruiz at 132 in what was the most exciting championship bout. Ruiz pulled off a pair of takedowns in the final 40 seconds to pull out a 7-5 win over Gilmer's Lucas Patterson.
Contact Lindsey Young at lyoung@timesfreepress.com or at 423-757-6296.