A young Carl Albert High School squad brought home a trophy from the Texas Outlaw Tournament in Allen.
The Titans from Midwest City had 476 points and took home third place in a tournament with 35 teams, ranging from Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, Louisiana and Tennessee.
Three other Oklahoma teams joined Carl Albert: Moore (17th), Blanchard (19th) and Tecumseh (32nd). Catoosa, who was in the tournament last year, did not return this winter.
“Our guys are about 70% and freshman and sophomores,” Carl Albert coach Curt Hodges said. “We come down here because it’s tough. Tournament just helps us get better. There’s no way you’re gonna get better wrestle tough kids.”
The Titans, ranked No. 2 in 5A, had three in the finals and Cache Williams took home a championship.
During the two-day tournament held Jan. 2-3, he went 8-0 and hiked his overall record to 25-0.
Through five rounds of pool matches, the 113-pounder won all by either pins or tech falls. That included needing all of 8 seconds to pin Ari Levy of Prosper, Texas, in the final pool match. Williams also had pins of 16 seconds and 28 seconds.
He won his championship by a pin in 3:02 against Allen’s Sebastian Hernandez. Williams led 6-1 after the first period and a takedown made it 9-1 before the fall.
In the semifinals, he won 6-3 against Ayden Galaraz from El Paso Eastwood.
“I was the number three seed, and then I bumped some guys,” Williams said. “I went there and got the win in the finals. And I had a tough semifinal match. Everybody here is pretty good.”
Kingston Sikes (165) and Maddux Underhill (175) were also in the finals for Carl Albert.
Sikes lost in overtime, 8-5, to Allen’s Steel Meyers. For a second, Sikes was announced as a 6-5 winner over the North Carolina pledge. A scoring miscue meant the match was tied at 5-5, rather than a 1-point win for Sikes.
Sikes had three pins and two tech falls and none of those five matches went into the second period.
Sikes fell to 22-1 on the year and for the second year in a row, the returning state finalist suffered his first loss of the year in Allen. Last year, he lost by a pin against Allen’s Carter Nekvapil.
In a unique twist, Nekvapil was responsible for the other loss in the finals.
He beat Underhill by an 8-5 decision. Nekvapil led 7-1 going into the third, but Underhill made it close with an escape early and then a takedown with 41 seconds left. That made it 7-5, but he gave up an escape and couldn’t forge a tie.
Underhill, 19-4, won six in a row by pins to reach the finals. His quickest pin was a 14-second victory.
The Titans were without Cash Wiley, who was a runner-up in the finals of the tournament last year.
Carl Albert had a pair of fifth-place finishers in Brayden Mixay (138) and Wesley Davies (157).
Mixay (25-1) lost in the quarterfinals to Andrew Tarango from El Paso Eastwood, but then won three in a row. Davies also made the semifinals and closed with two falls and a decision.
Moore had a fourth-place finisher in Carson Sherwin.
He lost in the third-place match by a tech fall against Sebastian Clark from Austin Lake Travis.
Sherwin went 6-3 in the tournament and two came to the finals. He lost in the first round to eventual champion Hector Ortiz of El Paso Eastwood. In the quarterfinals, Sherwin lost to Nick Payne from The Woodlands College Park. Payne lost to Ortiz in the finals, so Sherwin lost to the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place finishers.