Wrestling meet with 17 schools at HEM High School shortened due to winter weather and road closures across state
Miner Charlee Solaas, on the ground, gets ready to take on her opponent at the Carbon Invite on Friday at HEM.
Panther Jakob Hampton had a good showing at the Carbon Tournament on Friday.
Twenty schools were intending to come to the Carbon Tournament on February 14-15 at Hanna, Elk Mountain, Medicine Bow (HEM) High School. Due to the blustery wind and icy road conditions, three schools dropped out.
The wrestling event started at 1 p.m. and the gymnasium where the teams were staging their matches was packed with parents and friends from all the schools attending.
HEM, Saratoga and Rawlins were the Carbon County teams that showed up.
From HEM, Charlee Solaas at 126 gave the hometown fans a wrestling match that pitted her against another female wrestler. Although she did not win, points were scored making it an exciting match.
Justin Shotwell from Saratoga did well at the event as it started. There was a match where he pinned his opponent in less than 30 seconds. His aggressiveness on the mat was obvious.
Josh Curtis from HEM did well in the early rounds winning his match. Howard Bame, Declan Austin, Joseph Borah and Ayden Welk gave the home school reason to feel good about the first day of matches.
Jakob Hampton from Saratoga looked good against his opponents early on as did Jerry Everett. Cale Mowry won his match against the Pine Bluffs wrestler.
Jared Mason, head coach from Saratoga, said he was glad the team was getting experience before regionals.
The experience was cut short.
With so many teams wrestling, there was a lot of time neither school had any grappler on the mat.
As the first day ended towards 8 p.m., the weather outside started getting very treacherous for driving. Some people elected to carpool back to their hotels in nearby towns. This was a mistake for some.
US 30 shut down late that night and didn't open until Sunday.
The Carbon Tournament was canceled and the HEM parking lot had over a dozen cars waiting for their owners to make their way back.
Old man winter seems determined this season to make both Carbon County School District No. 2 wrestling teams go to regionals with skills they have learned in practice instead of going against wrestlers from different schools.
Regionals start February 22.
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