PORT ANGELES — The Sequim boys placed the highest among Olympic Peninsula teams at the annual Battle of the Axe in Port Angeles, while the Forks girls won their side of the meet.
The Battle of the Axe featured 13 teams from western Washington competing in a team duals format.
Sequim finished eighth, while Port Angeles was ninth, East Jefferson 10th and Forks 11th. Aberdeen won the meet by beating North Thurston 44-26 in the championship dual.
The Wolves began the meet by narrowly defeating Port Angeles 33-29. Sequim was able to pull out this match with two victories late in the heavier classes with Dylan Bowen beating John Labbe at 215 pounds with a pin and Max Silvilli beating Michael Wilhelm at 285, also by pin.
Washington beat Sequim 71-12 and Olympic beat Sequim 54-30. The Wolves had another close finish against North Mason, falling 33-29 to finish eighth.
For the day, Ryan Spelker at 126 pounds and Jaymes Vilona at 144 each went 4-0 with Vilona winning one match by forfeit, Bowen went 3-1 and Silvilli 2-2.
Port Angeles lost to Washington 43-36, beat Forks 45-32 in the consolation bracket, then beat East Jefferson 48-36 for ninth place.
For the Riders, John Grubbs went 4-0 on the day at 138 pounds with one of his victories a forfeit. Andrew Disher went 4-0 at 150 pounds. Kolby Helvey went 3-1 at 126 pounds and Alex Burrow went 2-2 at 120 pounds.
Forks lost to North Thurston 53-30 and in the closest dual of the meet, tied with Olympic 41-41. Olympic was awarded the tiebreaker as Forks had to forfeit three weight classes to two forfeits for Olympic.
In the 11th-place dual, Forks beat a team of JV all-stars 77-6.
Abraham Montealgre at 120 pounds went 4-0 on the day with three pins and a technical fall. Braden Camacho-Roldan at 132 pounds also went 4-0.
Jon Parker Jr. went 3-1 at 190 pounds and Landon Thomas at 144 also went 3-1 with one of his wins a forfeit. Adrian Sanchez at 150 pounds, Simeone Jackson-Cruz at 138, Luis Ornelas at 165 all went 2-2 for the day.
East Jefferson finished 10th. The Rivals started off beating Kingston 60-18, lost to Curtis 60-12, lost to Aberdeen 63-18, beat the JV all-stars 48-27 and lost to Port Angeles 48-36.
For the Rivals, Silas Klontz at 190 pounds went 4-1 on the day with all four of his wins by pin, two of them early in the first round.
East Jefferson’s Danyel Prichard at 120 went 2-1, Daniel Allen Avila at 144 went 3-2, Aiden Powell at 285 went 3-2. Chase Gardner at 126 pounds won two matches and Skye Trollsplinter at 157 won a pair of matches.
Forks girls first
The Forks girls won the Battle of the Axe with a total of five weight champions.
Kinley Rondeau at 97-102, Flora Horejsi at 104-109, Lillianna Galeana at 110-114, Peyton Johnson at 122-129 and Riley Tjepkema at 136-141 all went undefeated on the day to win their division. These five girls combined to go 14-0 on the day.
Finishing third was Viviana Luna at 117-126 pounds.
Port Angeles had a pair of first-place winners: Lilly Lancaster at 15-116 and Bryelle Wopperer at 144-153. Persephone Perry at 117-126 and Saffron Tschida at 126-132 both finished second.
For East Jefferson, Savvy Grimm finished second at 104-109 pounds and for Sequim, Story Snow was third at 115-116.
Forks finished with 96.5 points. Port Angeles was fourth with 65 points, East Jefferson sixth with 30 points and Sequim eighth with nine.
East Jefferson at Gut Check
Most of the East Jefferson wrestlers were at the Gut Check, a huge meet at the ShoWare Center in Kent. A total of 174 schools participated in the two-day meet.
None of the East Jefferson wrestlers were able to place, but several won matches and overall had good performances.
Mason Iverson (A Quilcene student) went 2-2 at 215 pounds to earn eight points. Manaseh Lanphear Ramirez went 3-2 at 150 pounds, earning five points.
Grady White at 157 also went 3-2, earning 7.5 points, while Rylen Kruse at 165 went 2-2 for five points.
Among the girls, Gracee Liske scored 11 points at 120 pounds. She went 4-2 with three pins.
