Closing out a brutal regular season schedule at the Ignacio Tournament on Feb. 1, the Dove Creek Bulldogs wrestling team enjoyed mixed results.
Helping to lead the team to a fourth place overall finish were 126-pound sophomore Case Baughman and 132-pound junior Chance Randolph, who finished first in their respective weight divisions.
Looking completely dominant throughout the tournament, Baughman and Randolph won all four of their matches by pin, suggesting that both wrestlers will enjoy solid postseasons.
Also wrestling well, yet narrowly missing out on a first-place finish was 113-pound sophomore Collin Hobbs, who, leading 6-0 in the championship match, got caught in a cradle and pinned.
“We’ve got to relearn how to defend that,” said Bulldogs’ head coach Shane Baughman, referring to his team’s recent difficulties handling cradles. “They know, but it just happens so fast.”
Other wrestlers competing for Dove Creek included Donavan Trudeau (0-2), Will Bartley (0-2) Tyler Knuckles (2-2) and Nick Jones (2-2).
For Jones, the 2-2 record came in the 145-pound division after the normally 138-pound wrestler elected to test his meddle against tougher competition.
With their regular season now complete, the Bulldogs will compete at the San Juan Basin League Tournament in Dove Creek on Feb. 6 before travelling to the Regional and State Tournaments.
“We’ll go two-a-days from now until regionals,” said Shane Baughman. “The conditioning will improve and we’re going to try to refine things. A lot of it is grinding things out these last few weeks and keeping the mental edge.”
