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Published Wednesday, February 03, 2010 in Sports

Only three more weeks of winter left for wrestlers

By Chris Goltermann

The Newnan Times-Herald

Forget the groundhog. High school wrestlers know exactly how many weeks are left of winter. Hopefully for most athletes in Coweta County, that number will be three.

Truly it's make or break time for East Coweta, Newnan and Northgate, which enter respective area tournament's this weekend hoping to qualify as many athletes as possible for next week's state sectionals.

At the sectionals, which feature the top-four finishers at area, the goal then becomes finishing as one of eight qualifiers for the state championships, each of which to be held at the Arena at Gwinnett Center on Feb. 18-20.

First step first, however. Respective head coaches know that the area tournaments will play a huge role in how far each of their athletes can go in the postseason. Finishes this week will determine where wrestlers are seeded at next week's sectionals.

"Seeding is what's important," said Northgate head coach Adrian Anderson. "You'll need to win two at sectionals (to move on)."

The Vikings may have gotten more than a warmup for area at last weekend's Bowdon Invitational, placing seven wrestlers among the top-four finishers. They were led by 140-pound freshman Tyler Askey, who continues to remain undefeated.

Askey, a nationally ranked youth wrestler in his first year of high school competition, dominated Darlington's Spencer Jones, a Class A state champion at 130 pounds last year, in a 23-8 decision.

Seniors Kyle Hennen (145), Jeffrey Higgins (152) and Chris Schenk (160) all finished second while settling into the weight classes they'll compete at for the rest of the year. Northgate travels to Fayette County on Friday and Saturday for the Region 5-AAAA tournament, arguably the most difficult to qualify for state from.

"It's one of the toughest in the state," said Northgate senior Tre Robinson, who has been working the past couple of weeks on making the move to 171 pounds where the Vikings had an opening in the lineup. "You look at last year and just about everyone that came out of our area placed at state."

Others placing last weekend at Bowdon included senior Justin Alderman, who finished third at 135 pounds. Daniel Higgins (125) and Kyle Black (112) each were fourth in respective weight classes.

Wrestlers will be seeded for the 5-AAAA tournament on Thursday. Askey will most likely bring a No. 1 seed, while Hennen, Higgins and Schenk should also get top-three attention.

Newnan and East Coweta prepare for Friday and Saturday's Area 4-AAAAA tournament to be hosted by ECHS at John Thrower Gym. It's the second straight year East Coweta has hosted the 4-AAAAA event after winning it in 2009.

While East Coweta took the weekend off after a season full of Saturday tournaments, Newnan stayed fresh by traveling to Bowdon. The Cougars were led by Lucas Malcom (140) and Caleb Spinks (145) both of whom reached the medal round.

"It was a pretty good set up for us in that we had wrestlers in 13 of 14 weight classes and the second day we started with 11 of them (in contention). Our younger wrestlers, we're beginning to see improvement from them."

The Area 4-AAAAA seeding meeting will be held tonight at East Coweta.

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