A Panther wrestler has made program history.
On Feb. 14, Franklin’s top male wrestlers traveled to Pisgah for the 3A West Individual Tournament. There Garrett Young placed among the top four in his weight class, becoming Franklin’s first-ever freshman to advance to the state tournament.
“The first match, I thought we would do what we did. We went out there and took care of business real fast, and didn’t waste a lot of energy,” said head coach Jimmy Barnett of Young in the 215-lb. weight class. “Then we had to wrestle the last match of the night of course on Friday night, and who did stick around got to see a real good freshman wrestle a technique match against a guy that’s 27-1 from Ashebrook. ... Garrett got a good takedown and the kid got down 3-0, and went into panic mode trying to score. Garrett catches him on his back and we score four points for a near-fall to go up 7-1. Garrett goes bottom, gets an escape and makes it 8-1, and then got caught for stalling and made it an 8-2 final.”
Versus Smoky Mountain’s Lee Parton and Ashebrook’s Caleb Gordon, Young made quick work of his early-round opponents. With a few hours of sleep after a late finish Friday night, Young returned to Pisgah Saturday morning for the semifinals.
“Saturday in the semis we wrestled Avery Rhyner from St. Stephens,” said Barnett. “We get an early takedown and a lead, but we get our nose busted. Garrett had problems breathing through his mouth, and we had to tape him up several times. ... That affected his mindset, and it affected his breathing of course. Rhymer got to catch his breath too, and he came back and beat us by one point.”
After three seperate injury stoppages to tape and retape Young’s nose, Rhymer came back to win 5-4, knocking Young back to the consolation semifinals. There he met Ashe County’s Benjamin Bare.
“Then he had to wrestle back to the ‘Blood Round – that’s what we call it. If you go to state, that match right before you qualify for state is called the ‘Blood Round,’” said Barnett. “He wrestled a kid and tech falled him in like a minute and 27 seconds – I mean, he just destroyed the kid. And then, I think it was like he just wanted to get to state – he really didn’t care where he placed in the region. he just wanted to qualify.”
In defeating Bare by tech fall less than two minutes in – wherein the match automatically ends when a wrestler takes a 15-point lead – Young punched his ticket to state and advanced to the consolation finals. There he fell to North Gaston’s Dewayne Davis in a 5-4 decision, placing fourth overall in his weight class.
In the 165-lb. and heavyweight classes, two more young Panthers battled tough competition.
“Preston [Douglas] had a kid from Smoky Mountain – he had lost to him in overtime, and then he pinned him in the conference [tournament],” said Barnett of the 165-lb weight class. “It was a back-and-forth match. The kid got an early lead on Preston, and went up big. I think it was 8-0 at one point, and then Preston rallied back and actually got the lead back. Different referees call pins differently, but everybody from Franklin thought we had him pinned. He doesn’t get the call, the match continues, the other boy scores more points and comes out on top.”
“Devlin [Bailey], the first match, he had a tough kid right from the get-go with Eli Frizzell. That was the first time we wrestled Eli, and it was maybe 40 seconds – it was not a very long match. Devlin had shored some things up on his feet, and there were no takedowns in the first period, so second period we took top, and Frizzell got an escape. It took about 40 seconds to get Devlin taken down, and when he landed it was straight to his back. It was a good, hard match for Devlin – a learning process of a freshman wrestling all these upperclassmen.”
Following regionals, Young traveled to Greensboro Feb. 22 for the 3A State Individual Finals, where he advanced to the tournament’s final day Feb. 24. The Press will report further on Young’s result in next week’s edition.