Dec. 2, 2007: CacheSports.com

MC, Logan Place 2nd at Respective Tournaments
by Jason Turner

If this weekend’s season-opening tournaments provided an accurate indication, expect big things from the Mountain Crest and Logan wrestling programs.

The Mustangs placed second out of 24 teams, only behind legendary Wasatch, at the prestigious Layton Invitational, while the Grizzlies were the runner-ups to Carbon at the 11-team Carbon Duals.

Led by finalists Raider Lofthouse, Jarrett Morrill and Ethen Lofthouse, Mountain Crest beat three of the top four 5A teams in the state, edging Bingham by six points (168.5-162.5) for the second spot. The Wasps finished with 219 points.

“The kids did a pretty good job,” MC coach Davie Swensen said. “I thought we could have done better, but it’s the best we’ve done here.”

Ethen Lofthouse and Morrill captured the 160- and 125-pound weight classes, respectively, beating a pair of highly-regarded grapplers in the championship round.

Lofthouse defeated Wasatch’s Ethan Smith, a state champion last winter, 5-3, while Morrill edged 2007 state runner-up Nic Florez of Layton 3-1. Raider Lofthouse came up short in his bid for the 112-pound title, falling to Viewmont’s Nate Larsen, a national champion, 5-2.

“This is a tough tournament,” Swensen said. “You should have heard the bios of some of the kids. I mean, there were several national champions and state champions at this tournament. … There were some great matches.”

Morrill’s weight class was especially loaded as three of the four semifinalists have won at least one state title in their career.

In addition to the aforementioned wrestlers, the Mustangs had several other kids fare well. Swensen was particularly pleased with Zabinadi Smethurst (fourth place at 103 pounds), Zemaleki Smethurst (sixth at 135) and Hayden Snow (fourth at 171).

“To step up at this kind of level and produce like that, that was great to see,” Swensen said of Zemaleki Smethurst, who is normally in the JV lineup.

Jake Morrill also placed for Mountain Crest — the two-time reigning 4A champs — finishing fourth at 130. Morrill dropped a narrow two-point decision in the semifinal round to a national champion from Texas, Swensen said.

As for the Grizzlies, they left central Utah feeling pretty good about themselves after going 5-0 Saturday, including a solid win over Monticello. Logan went 2-2 Friday.

“We wrestled so well today,” LHS coach Bo Roundy said. “We started out rusty (Friday). We really wanted to beat Tooele and didn’t … but we came back from a deficit and ended up getting a trophy.”

Several Grizzlies shined, especially Jesse Dunn (119) and Jordan Ballam (160), who went a combined 17-0. For his efforts, Ballam took first place, beating defending state runner-up Brandon Branch of Carbon in the process.

Because Dunn had one less pin than the other undefeated grappler in his class, the sophomore was awarded second place.

Returning state placers Josh Thompson (145), Josh Thatcher (152) and Brett Kendrick (189) each went 8-1 for the Grizzlies, with Thompson and Thatcher losing close bouts to state title-contending opponents from Tooele.

Freshman Justin Gualtier also only lost a single match, as did fellow 103-pound teammate Flint Keckler, who was wrestling for another school. Gualtier was one of three freshmen to compete in their first varsity matches for Logan.

“Our freshman, good knight … for their first varsity experience, they did an outstanding job,” Roundy said.

Perhaps the wrestler Roundy was most pleased with was Manuel Mendez. The senior started wrestling for the first time in his life three weeks ago, but somehow managed to go 6-3 at 130 pounds over the weekend.

“The thing I really liked is we wrestled better in every dual,” Roundy said. “It was like we gained energy as the day went on.”

Logan will see just how far its program has come next Tuesday when it hosts Mountain Crest at 7 p.m. Swensen and Roundy are both hoping for a big crowd.