Greybull-Riverside places third in Silver at Battle in the Bighorns

Greybull-Riverside places third in Silver at Battle in the Bighorns

By Nathan Oster

Greybull-Riverside closed out the pre-holiday portion of its schedule with an encouraging performance at the Battle in the Bighorns in Worland.

Loomis Alexander was the only individual champ, but four others including Ellie Holloway, Rhianna Gaytan, Zack Kuntz and Caiden Sorenson reached the final before suffering their first losses.

The Battle was set up as a dual tournament for the boys, culminating in a Best of the Best round, while the girls wrestled in pools on day one before transitioning to a bracketed tourney for day two.

Holloway, at 155, and Gaytan, at 130, took similar paths to the final. Each went 3-0 in the pools and won their first two tournament matches before Holloway was pinned at 2:26 by Sarah Eddy of Rock Springs and Gaytan lost 4-1 to Paige Tongate of Rock Springs.

Coach Mark Sanford was complementary of both, noting that Holloway led Eddy 3-1 after one. “That was awesome because that girl, she’s a best.  Ellie showed a lot of improvement from the first week. It should give her confidence, knowing she can wrestle with everyone.”

Gaytan wrestled a “phenomenal” match to defeat Sophie Laird of Rawlins in the semi and came close on multiple takedown attempts in her matchup with Tongate.

Tawny Bertolini went 2-1 in the pools, dropped her first tournament match, but then reeled off three straight wins to capture third place at 155B. “The semifinal match and the third-place match were among the best matches I’ve ever seen her wrestle,” Sanford said. “She was running good takedowns, being dominant on top and controlling the ties.”

G-R’s other three wrestlers combined for just a single win, that coming from Kadence Powell at 140 pounds. 

“Ashlyn (Chacon, at 120 pounds) sure wrestled a lot better as the weekend,” Sanford said. “Cadence, I can’t say enough about how coachable she is.  She wants to do well.  In her last match against the Rocky Mountain girl, she shot a great takedown, but got caught on her back. She was not happy. But I like that kind of attitude of, ‘I’m not here to be here, I’m here to do thing.’

“And Emily (Foote, at 135B) had kind of a tough go, but she’s been fighting through some injuries.”

Boys

Among the 2A teams in the stacked field, only Tongue River came away with a higher finish than G-R. The Eagles took second in the Silver division, one slot ahead of G-R. Familiar 2A foes Lovell, Rocky Mountain and Shoshoni all competed in the Bronze bracket.

G-R started in Pool D and went 2-2, defeating Lander 48-35 and Newcastle 57-11 while losing to Douglas 64-18 and Rock Springs 47-30.  The third-place finish sent the team to the Silver bracket for Saturday.

In it, G-R opened with a win over Thermopolis 42-24 but lost in the semis to Rawlins 42-34 before clipping Lander 48-36 in the battle for third.

Alexander (157), Sorenson (165) and Kuntz (190/215) each went 7-0 in the duals to earn spots in the Best of the Best.

In that showcase round, Alexander tech-falled Kaleb Hill of Cody, 17-1, to capture first place. Sanford described it as a “smart” and “very good technical” performance by the RHS senior.

Sorenson lost by fall to Lyndon Fornstrom of Pinedale in 1:48. Fornstrom was later named the outstanding wrestler for the upper weight classes. 

Kuntz lost by tech-fall, 20-2, to Kannon Grant of Cody.

G-R’s dual team also included Braxton Link at 106; Carlin Mulley at 120; Riley Wiggins, 2-4 at 138; Levi Cochrane at 144; Hayden Jensen, 2-4 at 160; Nikoah Sorensen, 2-5 at 175; Camden Schriner, 3-4 at 215/285, and Phillip Thomas, 1-3 at 285.

Bennett Sanford, who would normally go at 138 or 144, was held out due to illness.

On the JV side, Garrett Wiggins and Ben Mendenhall went first and second, respectively, at 157 while Corbyn Godfrey secured third at 190.

For the G-R matmen, the weekend actually began on Thursday in Basin.  Thermopolis was in and the two teams wrestled to a 36-all tie. On criteria, the Bobcats prevailed, 37-36.

Looking at the three days as a whole, Sanford believes his team “ran out of steam” in the semifinal loss to Rawlins. “To this point (in practice) we’ve done a little more instructing, maybe a little less conditioning ... we have to do better.

“It was a little disappointing; I thought we should have been in for the championship of the Silver, not for third place.”

G-R faced just one other 2A team in Worland, that being Thermop.

“Wrestling 3A teams is good for us because it makes us tougher,” he said.  “But (tournaments like this one) are awesome. I like doing them, especially early in the season, because they really bring your team together.”