Glacier Bear sophomore Leo Wald wrestles a Petersburg Viking in the Haines School gymnasium on Friday, Oct. 29. Haines hosted wrestlers from Petersburg and Thunder Mountain during last weekend’s tournament.
Eight Haines athletes competed at the wrestling meet in Haines this weekend. Juneau and Petersburg also attended. About 30 athletes competed and the majority of Glacier Bears earned wins.
There were spotlight matches at 4 p.m. on Oct. 30. Sophomore Leo Wald competed in the 152-weight class division. The wrestlers were tied with 16 seconds left in the second period. Wald won his spotlight match in the third period with a pin.
“It was fun to compete in front of the whole town,” said Wald. “I was very happy with my performance.”
Freshmen Dalton Henry and Hayden Jimenez also had spotlight matches. Jimenez competed against Juneau’s Colton Cummins for the third time in the tournament. Cummins beat Jimenez with a pin.
Sophomore Jackson Long only had one match against teammate Douglas Adams. Long pinned Adams in 40 seconds.
Junior Luke Davis competed in the 135-weight class division. He finished the tournament with only one loss. This was his first time competing since 2019.
“It was exciting to get back to wrestling,” said Davis. “I haven’t wrestled much since freshman year and I’m looking forward to progressing during the course of the season.”
The wrestling coaches combined weight classes to give the athletes more matches. Wald had to wrestle Juneau’s Denali Schijvens. Schijvens is one weight class above Wald. Wald defeated Schijvens with a pin in the third period.
The wrestling team does not have a tournament this weekend. They’ll be competing in Ketchikan from Nov. 12-13. The regional meet is in Wrangell on Dec. 10-11. The top three wrestlers in each weight class will qualify for state. State is held in UAA’s Thunderdome from Dec. 17-18.
Sidebar
In other Glacier Bear sports news, the junior varsity volleyball team played Skagway on Oct. 29 and 30. The team lost to Skagway in three sets the first night, and in four sets the second.
This was the first high school game for many of the players. The junior varsity consists of five freshman and one sophomore.
The varsity team had planned to play in Petersburg from Nov. 5-6, but Haines is not attending because Petersburg is experiencing a COVID-19 outbreak.
Skagway is now coming to Haines to play Nov. 5-6. This is will be the last tournament before regionals.