TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Countryside, Durant Post Top-5 Finishes

ADVERTISEMENT

By LEE DIEKEMPER, Tribune correspondent

Published: February 10, 2008

TARPON SPRINGS - Countryside and Durant finished fourth and fifth, respectively, in the two-day Class 3A-Region 2 wrestling tournament, which wrapped up Saturday at East Lake High.

Kissimmee Osceola won the region with 185.5 points, followed by Palm Bay with 184.5

Countryside finished with 160 points, while Durant had 98.5. Bloomingdale finished sixth with 86 and East Lake totaled 73.5 for seventh.

Countryside won four weight divisions. Dalton Dennis won a major decision at 103 pounds over Pinellas Park's Nick Andres, 14-5; Lyle Grueinger pinned Cory Monteforte of Sarasota at 112; Tyler Perry posted a decision over Palm Bay's Kyle Hornor, and Eric Deupree defeated Palm Bay's Darius Pittman, 6-1

Durant won titles in two weight classes. Christian Reed defeated Sarasota's Austin Brown at 125 and Yamil Crespo topped Tim Eggers of Kissimmee Osceola at 145.

Bloomingdale's Chris Figari won the 140-pound class, while East Lake's Alex Dinelli won the 285 division as the only other area wrestlers to win their weight classes.

Wrestlers who advanced to the regional finals or the consolation finals secured berths in state tournament beginning Feb. 14 at The Lakeland Center. Countryside qualified eight wrestlers, while Durant will be sending four and Bloomingdale three.

"We have done everything I hoped we would do," Countryside coach Mark Prince said. "We had five in the finals, last year we had four. Last year we had two champs but this year we have four. The teams in front of us have good wrestlers in weight classes where we don't. To come in here with 10 wrestlers and to move eight along, that's strong."

Durant coach Dennis Kitko could barely speak, having lost most of his voice. Part of that was from the excitement of how well his team wrestled.

"We are doing fine," Kitko said. "We have a young team, and they are doing a great job. Better than I thought we would."

In particular, he was happy with Reed's win.

"Wrestling as a senior has given me all the drive in the world," Reed said. "I was so determined to win it this year. It feels good to be a region champion."

"We are pretty pleased," Bloomingdale coach Dennis Peek said. "We've got three going to the state tournament. We'd like to sneak a few more, but the three we have going I think gives us a shot of placing in the top 10 next week."

Figari posted an upset win against Gabriel Bird to win his weight class.

"I was a bit nervous," said Figari. Bird "was my toughest competition. It was real close tonight. I just kept wrestling, and it was as tough as I thought it would be. I just went out and wrestled my hardest. He was ranked above me so I will have good seeding for the state tournament. People will look at me differently now."

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT