Black Diamonds ready for Tuesday’s District 4A-8 Duals after Sapulpa Tournament
After the Sallisaw Black Diamonds wrestle in the twoday Sapulpa Tournament, which will be today and Saturday, they will try to repeat as District 4A-8 champions and earn a second straight trip to the Class 4A Dual State Tournament.
The Black Diamonds will entertain Checotah, Hilldale, Inola and Wagoner beginning at 3 p.m. Tuesday.
Each team will wrestle the other four in a dual, and the team with the best win-loss record will win the District 4A-8 Duals and qualify for the Class 4A Dual State Tournament, which will be Feb. 14-15.
“We’re lucky enough that we have our District Duals here,” Sallisaw boys coach Mark Smith said. “We’re still a little bit down. We have a lot of freshmen scattered throughout that line-up, but we’re going to have to suck it up. I think we can have every weight covered. We have two at 215 (pounds, Kash Keepes and Tukker Chase), and we’ll have to bump one of them up to heavyweight.”
Sallisaw’s line-up for Tuesday’s District Duals will be Rangler Carter at 106 pounds, Cason Craft at 113, Morgan Duke at 120, Lucas McAllister at 126, Blake Lamb at 132, Dawson Glover at 138, Talon Flynn at 144, Cash Mayfield at 150, Cole Mayfield at 157, Anthony Adame at 165, Bodie Adams at 175, Hunter Smith at 190, Keepes at 215 and Chase at heavyweight.
“Hopefully, we can get some of these guys down to weight,” Smith said. “We’ll be able to put somebody out there.”
As of right now, the Black Diamonds (0-2 in duals so far this season) are the favorite to repeat, but it will take a strong effort to make it happen.
“We just kind of looked at the rankings,” Smith said. “Right now, we would be No. 1 — not necessarily on paper, but just going off what the OSSAA (Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activities Association) has us ranked. Wagoner would be No. 2. We were thinking Hilldale around No. 3 or No. 4. They’re probably pretty close to Inola. Checotah has some really good kids, but they just don’t have a lot of depth. We’re going to have to compete against everybody. We have a lot of freshmen trickling throughout this lineup. They’re going to have to step up and win some matches for us.”
The season hasn’t gone quite as hoped to this point as the Black Diamonds have had to deal with injuries and illnesses, not to mention getting snowed out of last weekend’s Cushing Tournament. However, the wrestlers made the trip to Payne County a profitable one.
“The good thing about last week was that the whole state missed out on wrestling (due to Thursday’s snowstorm), so it wasn’t just us,” Smith said. “We ended up getting to work out with (the) Stillwater High School (wrestling team). In the last five or six years, they’re one of the top five programs in the country. A lot of our kids got to hit some No. 1s and No. 2s in the nation and work out with them. I’m not so sure that it might not have been just as beneficial just getting to work out with those guys for a couple of days. It was a lost tournament (last weekend at Cushing). Cushing is one of our big tournaments. There’s a lot of good teams in it. We hated to miss it, but at the same time we got some good workouts. We got to come home with some battles behind us.”
If the Black Diamonds can repeat as District 4A-8 Duals champions and earn a second straight trip to the Class 4A Dual State Tournament, it would be a nice way to get the stretch drive of the season going in the right direction.
“It would be nice,” Smith said. “We haven’t had much luck this year as a team. Some individuals have looked great — some guys are looking really good as a matter of fact, and some of them are our younger guys. As a team, it’s been a little bit of a struggle. If we win districts (District Duals), that would be a nice little way to get things going at the end of the year.”
