Fort Mill wrestling survives Dorman test to reach Upper State finals

It wasn’t a cake walk like the first two rounds, but the Fort Mill Yellow Jackets still punched their ticket to the 5A Upper State wrestling championship Wednesday with a 42-27 win over the fourth-ranked Dorman Cavaliers.

In their second meeting of the season, Dorman (16-6) came back to Fort Mill (20-4) since falling in controversial fashion during the finals of the Mill Town Duals earlier this season against the Jackets losing 42-34 after one of their wrestlers was disqualified. This time, the Cavaliers were on their best behavior, but still weren’t able to gain much ground on Fort Mill.

Dorman came into the third round of the 5A playoffs ranked fourth in the state with Fort Mill carrying the No.1 ranking in the latest polls. But rankings aside, both teams knew things would be harder the second time around against each other.

The draw for the match was at heavyweight, which proved beneficial for Fort Mill in the first two rounds, as the Jackets quickly went back to their smaller weights, where they dominated.

Dorman went up 3-0 after a win at heavyweight in a 6-1 decision by TJ Boyd. Fort Mill bounced back at 106 to go up 6-3 with a pin from Jackson Strong in the second period. Fort Mill extended its lead with a major decision from Jacob Sturgeon to get a 10-3 lead.

After falling at 126-pounds, the Jackets bounded back at 132-pounds to expand their lead with a close 8-7 win from Nick Greek. Fort Mill then subbed in Josh Cizmadia at 138-pounds in AJ Leitten’s place and Cizmadia kept the momentum going with a first period pin.

“They bumped some guys around too and sometimes that is a gamble,” said Fort Mill head coach Chris Brock. “Sometimes that is worth the gamble.”

Turning point

With bumping Leitten up to 145-pounds, it allowed Fort Mill some breathing room to push their better wrestlers to more of a middleweight level. It turned out to be what was needed as the Jackets got a tech fall from Jake Hart at 152-pounds and Caden Haverson had a pin at 170-pounds to lock the win in for Fort Mill.

Critical

Dorman moved some wrestlers around, as well. Many were expecting Dorman’s top wrestler in the state at 120-pounds in Josh Aquino but instead, Aquino came out at 126 to match-up with Fort Mill’s third-ranked wrestler in Brody Claassen with the Jackets leading 16-3. Claassen and Aquino wrestled a tight match, but Dorman came away with a decision. This was critical for Fort Mill, because Claassen didn’t get pinned and managed to not allow any Cavalier bonus points.

Star contributions

Fort Mill got wins from some of their lesser known wrestlers like Greek, Cizmadia, Haverson and Zach Hornbrook (120) which allowed the Jackets to get wins in key situations and keep the momentum fully in their favor.

On deck

The Jackets will take on Rock Hill Wednesday in the Upper State finals at Fort Mill at 7 p.m. Rock Hill is ranked second in the state and will face Fort Mill for a third time this season as they have split matches earlier in the season.

Box score

Fort Mill 42, Dorman 27

This story was originally published February 6, 2017 at 9:37 PM with the headline "Fort Mill wrestling survives Dorman test to reach Upper State finals."