But both senior athletes will admit that excelling on the football field doesn’t mean you’re 100 percent ready for the wrestling season to start.
“There’s football shape and wrestling shape, and it’s definitely different,” Ford said. “It’s early in the season, so that’s everyone’s goal, getting into wrestling condition.”
While both said they had a ways to go before they achieve that goal, Ford and Pine each kicked off their wrestling season successfully with a title at the Timberline Invitational on Saturday.
Ford, a state champion two years ago at 140 pounds, won the 160-pound weight class, and Pine, who finished seventh at the Class 4A state tournament last year, took the 189-pound title.
“It’s a good tournament to start the season off with,” said Ford, an 8-3 winner over Shelton’s Damion Shehan in the finals. “I wrestled up a weight class. I’ll be wrestling at 152 pounds this year, but it’s good to get the time in.”
Pine pinned all three of his opponents, including Chehalis’ Austin Hansen (3 minutes, 14 seconds) in the final.
“I think the biggest thing is shifting from that team mentality in football to being alone out there on the mat,” Pine said.
Centralia captured the team title with 258.5 points. The Tigers had four individual champions: Kyle Shaw (112 pounds), Jose Abina (130), Kellen Pelzel (135) and Connor Pelzel, who edged Chehalis’ Alex Nunez, 10-8, to win the 145-pound final.
Chehalis, which got titles from Jesse O’Camb (119) and Cody Sandercock (215), finished second with 200 points.
O’Camb, who placed second and third the past two years at the Class 2A state tournament, beat Centralia’s Chris Lazo, 13-11, in overtime of the 119-pound final.
Rochester was a distant third with 120. points. The Warriors had a pair of champions as Blake Markva defeated Centralia’s Alex Farias, 11-0, at 125 pounds and Zach Eastman blanked Andrew White of Chehalis, 4-0, at 140.
River Ridge (107 points) and Olympia (98.5) finished fourth and fifth, respectively.
In addition to Ford’s title, River Ridge got a championship from Cameron Determyer, who beat teammate David Allen, 9-4, in the final at 275 pounds. Determyer scored a reversal and a reversal and a near fall in the final seconds to break a 4-4 tie.
“I was just trying to do whatever I could out there at the end,” an exhausted Determyer said after the victory. “I’m not really sure what I did. I was just trying to grab whatever I could get, and it ended up working out.”
Host Timberline (88 points) took seventh place. The Blazers’ lone title came in the 171-pound division, where Andre Courie defeated River Ridge’s Justin Polzin, 4-3, in overtime.
The end of the match came when Polzin slammed Courie to the mat, drawing an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in sudden death.
Unable to get to his feet, Courie required emergency medical assistance. He was was placed on a stretcher and was transported to Providence St. Peter Hospital while wearing a neck brace.
“(Andre) is going to get checked out. Hopefully it’s just for precautionary reasons,” Timberline coach Jeff Birbeck. “He was complaining of neck pain.”
Bremerton’s Lauren Richardson pinned Olympia Kevin Tran (3:18) in the 103-pound final, and Franklin Pierce’s Torrey Turner defeated Chehalis’ Graham Brennen, 7-6, to win the 152-pound division.
North Thurston (61 points) finished eighth, followed by Shelton (58) and Capital (21).
