Dual-meet 4A Kingco title: check. Confidence heading into this weekend’s league tournament: double check.
That’s how the Inglemoor High wrestlers are rolling, and co-coach Kevin Corbett stressed working even harder now that one of the team’s goals has been realized.
“Something we talk about all the time, it’s an old adage, ‘iron sharpens iron,’ and we have to pound on each other to make each other tough,” Corbett said during Monday’s practice. “The dual-meet season’s over. We’re a team, but we’re a chain of individual links. We’re all going into this (weekend) zero-zero — we’ve all wrestled everybody in the league, everybody knows us, there’s no surprises, so we have to be even better now.”
Leading the way are senior co-captains Anthony Bratcher, a 135-pounder with a 27-1 record, and his partner in crime Brian Trabun, a 145-pounder with a 25-3 record. Other top wrestlers are senior Ben Grabowski (171), sophomore Josh Koukal (189), junior Sam Gastineau (160) and sophomore Shane Merrill (112).
Inglemoor began the season with a 53-9 thrashing of Redmond and completed its 4A Kingco journey with a 51-21 victory over Skyline last week. With the convincing win, the Viks grabbed the league dual-meet championship with a 10-0 record.
Next up is Friday and Saturday’s Kingco Tournament at Juanita High.
“For as young as we are, for these kids to get a taste of that championship … it’s a long season and to be able to do it as a team is a big deal,” Corbett said.
Corbett credits co-coach Paul Schulfer for keeping the Viks motivated, healthy and working hard on their techniques all season.
“We coaches get energy from the kids that they bring every day, and that’s why we do it — it’s fun,” Corbett said.
• According to Bothell coach Scott Labrash, his top seeds heading into this weekend’s tourney are senior Chris Ungerecht (112), who has a 22-4 record; and sophomore Brandon Davidson (145), sporting a 20-7 record.
Ungerecht won the 103-pound division at Kingco the last two years and is going for a title hat trick at 112 this weekend.
Other standout Cougar wrestlers are: junior Willem Gmazel (160), sophomore Zachary Alvis (152), junior David Schormann (119), junior Osbaldo DelReal (215) and junior Dustin Rohde (145).
