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Show w i i n 24 Yemal ExpreSi Wednesdoy, February 20, 1985 The state tournament was used by some wrestlers for a chance to gain revenge and one such matman was Darren Johnson, Uintah's 105 pounder. Johnson was pinned by Pat Keenan of Judge Memorial in the first round last year at 98 pounds and then he blew a match with Trulan Preece of Mountain Crest, 8-6, when Preece scored a three-point near fall in the final nine seconds. Johnson wrestled a number of matches mat-ches earlier during the season and he was either pinned or lost a lopsided decision. However, Johnson turned things around when he placed third at the Vernal Tournament of Cham-. pions and lost. 4-2 to Lyle Larsen of Timpview in the Region 7 championship. champion-ship. Uintah's Johnson proved he was a major wrestling force at 105 pounds as he pinned Sean Shepard, a state placer last year and downed Mike Jdsie of Murray, 13-5. Johnson turned in a good first round with David Crawford, which ended at 4-4. However, Crawford pinned Johnson in the second round for the only dark spot on the Johnson wrestling performance. perfor-mance. Johnson came back with a 6-1 win over Eric Ross of Payson and placed third and gained revenge at the same time with a 13-3 win over Keenan. "He pinned me last year in the first round and I had revenge in mind-big time. I knew I could beat him cause he just barely beat some of his opponents. op-ponents. He beat Glenn Burke of Pro-vo, Pro-vo, 14-10, in overtime. I decided I had to let all the mental problems go out of my mind and concentrate on wrestling," stated Johnson. . Johnson added, "I was going for the cradle in the match with Keenan cause he has long legs and that is what he pinned me with last year." George Cook gained two revenge wins in the state tournament. Cook finished second to Darren Geisler of Mountain View in the Region 7 tournament, tour-nament, but Cook gained revenge when he pinned Geisler in the third round at the state meet. Cook suffered suf-fered the only Uintah Ute loss in a team win over American Fork as he was decisioned by Gerald Kitchen. Cook gained revenge when he pinned Kitchen with 12 seconds left in the second se-cond round for third place. Kitchen grabbed a 2-0 lead in the first round on a takedown, but Cook exploded for a pin in the second round and Cook remarked, "I got a 1 jr. t 1 -iff" if Vr " - k I I 4 1 ..V HNr- 1 WRESTLING ADVICE is given to Ryan Siddoway, Sid-doway, left, by Uintah Ute head coach Ed Johnson, right, during a break before overtime action. Siddoway ended up losing the overtime match by one point. Siddoway, Richard Hor-rocks Hor-rocks and Rick Porter didn't place, but scored points for the Utes. neutral and a whipover for the takedown and I put him down for the pin. The pin was just off the whipover. I was in a locked position and I fell into it. He was pushing into me so I tried the whipover and it worked for a pin. The win gave me revenge for losing to him in Vernal. It was about time for me to decided it in favor of me." The Uintah Utes won the state tournament tour-nament for the 14th time since 1968 and the 164 1-2 to 132 1-2 title win this year over Spanish Fork was a complete com-plete team effort as all Uintah wrestlers scored points. The Uintah Utes also placed first in 1958 and 1959 and pocketed second places in 1966, 1967 and 1984. Gary Murray placed first at 155 pounds and Craig Funk, 132 and Mike Smith, 138, pocketed second places. Darren Johnson, 105; Joe Newell, 126 and George Cook, 145, placed third. Mike Slaugh, 185, nabbed fourth. Kyle Smuin, 98 and Matt Sunkees, heavyweight, garnered sixth place. Richard Horrocks, 112; Ryan Siddoway, Sid-doway, 119 and Rick Porter, 167, didn't place, but they won matches. Horrocks and Siddoway won two matches and Porter netted one win. "Taking state feels great. It was a complete team effort. Everyone scored points. We got aggressive on the mat, but it's too bad we lost some individual championships. However, we won our number 16 state championship. cham-pionship. Gary Murray joined his dad as a state champ and the first father-son father-son state champion combination at Uintah High School," commented Ed Johnson, Uintah High School wrestling wrestl-ing coach. Johnson was a member of a Uintah High School state championship team as a wrestler and was a member of a Ute state championship team as an assistant coach and is now a member of a Uintah High School state championship team as a head coach. One of the most exciting matches at the state tournament involved Uintah's Uin-tah's Mike Smith and Troy Barker of Sky View. Smith scored a takedown in the first round to go up by two points at 2-0, but a near fall by Barker tied up the match at 2-2 in the second round. Barker garnered a 3-2 lead when he scored a neutral early in the third round. Smith needed a takedown for a semi-final win and he had to get it twice. Smith netted a takedown with 26 seconds left, but the referee wiped off the points. However, Smith finally scored his takedown with 13 seconds left and won the match by one point. "The takedown was just a power crossface and I just spun around him. I knew I had to get it to go into the finals. Time was running down and I heard coach tell me time was running runn-ing out so I figured I better get the two and I did," stated Smith. "I shucked him for the first takedown in the first round. I faked a duck under end as he was going down, I hit him with the shuck." Craig Funk didn't have to stage any last second point scoring moves as he beat his semi-final opponent, Greg Rhincer of Provo, 11 to 1, at 132 pounds. Gary Murray reached his title ti-tle match with a win over Chad Max-field Max-field of Pleasant Grove, 141 and beat Travis Gittcns. Mountain Crest, 14-3, for first place. When a.sked to comment on his match Craig Funk remarked, "I used an arm bar and under hook for the near fall. I cranked him over and got the near fail. The takedown In the first round was a Brighton special. I put my arm between the crotch and got the arm bar and then twisted him over." Joe Newell lost out in his bid for an individual championship when he was pinned by Angelo Trujillo in the first round. Trujillo went on to place first in the 126 pound class. Some wrestlers might give up when the first place title chase is overwith, but Newell, Johnson, Cook, Slaugh, Smuin, Sunkees, Siddoway, Horrocks and Porter didn't give up when the first place dream died as they picked up consolation points to help lead the Utes to the team title. Newell, Johnson and Cook placed third and Newell nabbed third when he downed Jacob Brown of Ben Lomond, 5-1. "I went in for the high crotch and ended up with the single, kicked his thigh and sent him down to the mat for one takedown. My opponent was trying to throw me and I countered him and put him down for a takedown," stated Newell. "I would like to thank God and the team for support." One of the keys to the Uintah High School state championship was the Uintah performance in the first three weights at the state tournament. The Utes had found themselves behind 18-0 after the first three weights in some meets, but Uintah didn't have problems in the first three weights, 98, 105 and 112 at the state tournament tourna-ment as 98 pounder Kyle Smuin placed plac-ed sixth; 105 pounder Darren Johnson garnered third place and 112 pounder Ryan Horrocks won two matches with falls. Ryan Siddoway placed first last year at 105 pounds, but he didn't place at all this year. Siddoway was too big for 112 pounds and a bit small for 119 pounds. Siddoway pulled off one of the shockers in the tournament as he beat Tyler Peterson of West, 4-2, who was one of the state champion cham-pion favorites. Siddoway lost to Garrett Bona of Payson, 6-4, but beat Shane Peterson of Mountain Crest. Siddoway was eliminated when he lost by one point in overtime to Tyler Peterson of West. The Utes refused to let the elimination elimina-tion of their state champion destroy their team championship hopes as they turned in great teamwork and placed first. Uintah's Craig Funk, Mike Smith and Gary Murray reached the title matches and had some outstanding k j v 1 - ..- t 1 ; - A performances. All the rest of the Utes stood out, but one of the most outstanding outstan-ding performances was turned in by George Cook. Cook didn't place at all last year at the state meet, but placed plac-ed third this year. Hs won his first match 2nd then lost his second one. Cook beat Kelly War-die War-die of Provo in overtime and gained pins over Darren Geisler of Mountain View and Gerald Kitchen of American Fork. Mike Slaugh also shined in his fourth place performance. He pinned his first two opponents and then lost a close decision to eventual champ, Layne Shepherd of Spanish Fork. Shepherd had only a 2-1 lead after two rounds. Slaugh downed Tolton of Payson, 5-2 and was pinned by Dehek of Mountain Crest. Joe Newell won 8-0 and 14-1 matches, mat-ches, but lost to Angelo Trujillo of Jordan on a first round pin. However, Newell came back and thumped Darren Dar-ren Conder of American Fork, 15-2 and Jacob Brown of Ben Lomond, 5-1. Newell just barely beat Conder in a meet at Uintah High School. Matt Sunkees had problems with Tom Narr of Judge Memorial. Narr handed Sunkees a 12-4 first round loss, but Sunkees won three matches in a row. Sunkees lost to Dan Phelon of Pleasant Grove and lost a second match to Narr of Judge on a pin in the heavyweight class. The three Utes, who reached the championship matches for the Uintah Uin-tah team helped the Ute cause. Murray Mur-ray delivered a pin, two superior decisions and a major decision fo score extra points for the Utes. Smith, 138, scored a pin and major decision for extra points and came through with a close win. Funk produced pro-duced two falls and a major decision to put extra points in the Ute collection. collec-tion. Uintah High School wrestled like the Ute teams of the past as they won the matches they had to, had fourth place and third place matmen knock off higher rated wrestlers, piled up extra points and refused to give up their title hopes when a top Uintah Ute matman went down in defeat and thus produced team championship number 16 in the sport of wrestling. Only Delta has won more state wrestling crowns as they won number 17th at the 2-A state meet this year. ' J "WHAT NO POINTS!" might be what Judge Memorial's wrestling wrestl-ing coach is expressing during a bout at the 3 A State Tournament Tourna-ment at Murray High School last week. A f-LVLN'GE V:fi is at Da?i hyrn. 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