Wolves send 13 to regional meet

For the South Kitsap wrestling team, 13 seems to be the luckiest of numbers.

Well, maybe not lucky but a good one for sure because that’s how many wrestlers are moving on to this weekends West Central District Regional Wrestling tournament.

“It was a good tournament,” co-coach Dave Dyess said. “The kids that had good practices the last couple of weeks, they performed well. The kids that didn’t, they struggled.”

The top four placers in the sub-regional moved on to the regionals at Foss High School. The top four after Saturday will advance to the Mat Classic Feb. 18-19 at the Tacoma Dome.

South turned the sub-regional into its own invitational tournament by getting nine wrestlers into the finals and taking the team title with 320 points.

Of those nine, five went on to claim individual titles.

Josiah Kipperberg (103), Chris Hogan (140), Steve Medina (152), Brent Chriswell (171) and Lenny Schwartz (189) all claimed titles, while Brandon Kelly, Bobby Arendsee, Orry Perez and Kyle Saltsgaver took second in their respective weight classes.

Other Wolves who advanced include Rodger Nutall, Garrett Lyman, Ian Richardson and Brady Winslow.

Kurtis Fenton, Jon Delucia and Jesse Barich will serve as alternates.

“It’s all about moving on to the next weekend,” Dyess said. “Living to see another day and this (Coming) weekend is the same thing. Getting into it and getting on to state. It doesn’t matter how you do it.”

Of all the wrestlers advancing, there were a few surprises, which Dyess said is always nice to see.

The biggest on might have been Richardson, who finished fourth at 160 pounds to move on.

“He doesn’t surprise me when I think about his practices,” co-coach Dave Dyess said. “The last two weeks he’s had some good practices. He’s not a surprise but it’s nice to see a sophomore getting into regionals.”

South also had two of its guys face off for the 140-pound crown as Hogan and Arendsee both moved into the finals. Hogan won the match but both will move on.

“Bobby was a little discouraged,” Dyess said. “But we talked to him (and got him to see) that the neat thing is that they are both in. From the coaches’ perspective, we’d like to see that at every weight.”

And it’s possible for the two to meet again but the stakes are higher and competition will be much tougher this coming weekend, Dyess said.

The sub-regional gets under way at 5 p.m. Friday at Foss. Saturday’s matches get started at 10 a.m. with the finals getting under way around 3 p.m.

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