FIVE UTAH COUNTY WRESTLERS SET TO COMPETE AT ALL-STAR CLASSIC
FIVE UTAH COUNTY WRESTLERS SET TO COMPETE AT ALL-STAR CLASSIC
Five Utah County wrestlers are set to wrestle in the Sixth Annual All-Star Classic. The All-Star classic will be held at the UVSC McKay Event Center Tuesday January 9 with the matches to commence at 7:00 PM.
Utah County has been a hotbed for Utah wrestling for the last several decades but this might be bit of a down year, at least on the All-Star side. With 56 wrestlers in the event this year, five wrestlers seems a bit low considering that in last year’s event which featured a different format and just 28 wrestlers, eight participants were from Utah County schools.
This season Region 4 will only have one representative in Mitch Sanderson. Region 7 had five representatives last year but will have four this year, two of those repeat invitees in Springville’s Kolby Bradley and Jason Chamberlain.
In last year’s event Utah County wrestlers fared extremely well and in the format, which teamed the 4-A and 5-A together against the 1-A, 2-A and 3-A, the larger schools won handily 37-19 with Region 7 leading the way with four victories for the 4-A/5-A team. In fact, Region 7 alone outscored the small classification schools 20-19.
Three of these wrestlers will be from Springville HS as Kolby Bradley, Logan Wilson and Jason Chamberlain will represent the Red Devils. Provo’s David Ojuka will also represent Region 7 while Pleasant Grove’s Mitch Sanderson will take the mat to represent Regon 4.
Bradley of Springville High School is a three-time state placer and two-time state champion. He has lost just three times this season, all at the rugged Reno Tournament of Champions where Bradley placed eighth. Bradley won the Layton Invitational this year as well as going undefeated at the Wasatch Duals. Bradley’s opponent at 119 pounds will be West Jordan’s Nicko Paraso, a junior who placed second at state last year.
Wilson will be the second wrestler from Springville HS to take the mat Tuesday night at 125 pounds. He will take on a returning state champ in Casey Pettus of Hurricane HS. Wilson is a two-time state finalist. In his sophomore year he actually lost to teammate Bradley in the final match at 103 pounds and last year Wilson was narrowly decisioned by Matt Brown of Cyprus, a junior who will also take the mat Tuesday night in the All-Star dual at 135 pounds. Wilson placed second at the Layton Invitational and just missed placing at the Reno tournament.
Chamberlain might be the most “famous” of the Springville wrestling trio. Just a junior Chamberlain recently won the Reno Tournament of Champions thus securing All-American status for the second straight year. He is also a freestyle All-American as he placed third at the Cadet Nationals in Fargo, North Dakota. Chamberlain has secured two state titles and is going for this third. He has lost only three matches in his prep career, two as a freshman where he avenged those losses and once last year at the Reno event. Even that loss set up Chamberlain for an amazing feat. Chamberlain was upset in his first match of the tournament then won an incredible nine matches in a row to place third. On this route to All-American status, he defeated the opponent from Foothill, CA that beat him. Chamberlain. Davis’s Sean Porter, who Chamberlain will wrestle in the feature match of the night, gave Chamberlain his best in-state challenge of recent, losing by just a 2-1 margin. Many in the wrestling community are eagerly awaiting this rematch at 140 pounds between two opponents that come in with a combined five state titles.
Also representing Region 7 will be Provo’s Ojuka who is undefeated this year. He started wrestling as a freshman and didn’t qualify for state until his junior year where he put together a nice run of matches to place third in this event. He has picked up where he left off by winning 19 straight matches this year and has been named as the Outstanding Wrestler in both the 4-A State Duals and the Excalibur Duals hosted by Northridge HS. He also won the Davis Turkey Dart Invitational. Ojuka is one of the most athletic wrestlers fans will watch at the event Tuesday night, relatively inexperienced to most who will grapple in the All-Star classic but one who has picked up the sport quickly due to stunning athleticism. Ojuka’s opponent Jared Ruppe is a two-time state placer and placed second in state last year as a junior. Both Ojuka and Ruppe are planning on competing at 160 pounds for the rest of the season though they will represent their classification at 171 pounds where each has wrestled the bulk of the season thus far.
Region 4’s sole representative comes from a famous wrestling family. Mitch Sanderson is the first cousin of Cael Sanderson, arguably the greatest amateur wrestler ever and Olympic gold medalist. Sanderson placed second at the Millard Duals and placed fourth at the Reno Tournament of Champions. He also took on the challenge of wrestling in the toughest tournament in the United States, the Beast of the East in Newark, Delaware. This ambitious schedule has left Sanderson with five losses but he will well prepared for region, state and a likely college wrestling career. Sanderson is a two-time state champion for Pleasant Grove High School and his father Kelly is an Assistant Coach at the school. Sanderson’s task will be to take on the only Utah wrestler to defeat Sanderson in the past two years when he squares off with Millard’s Wade Eldredge Tuesday night at 171 pounds. Eldredge is a two-time state champion out of Monticello high school originally. He moved to Brighton HS and played football for the Bengals this fall before landing at Millard at the start of the wrestling season.
Though the Utah County contingent of wrestlers is smaller than in past years, expect a good showing from these five wrestlers. At least for the 4-A team, the four Region 7 wrestlers will make a huge impact on how the team race between the classifications comes out. As for Sanderson, he will be the lone Utah County representative on the 5-A team, which is dominated by Region 1, which is definitely the most rugged wrestling region in Utah.