Craig Daily Press

ARVADA -- The regional wrestling title is back in the hands of Moffat County High School wrestlers. After losing it for the first time in eight seasons last year, the Bulldogs earned it back in typical bad-to-the-bone, MoCo fashion on Saturday -- with pins and wins from everybody.

"It was a huge team effort," said senior Nick Navratil, who was one of three regional champs. "Pretty much everybody contributed."

The Bulldogs placed 12 of 14 wrestlers in the top six of the 17-team tournament. In addition, eight of the Moffat wrestlers qualified for the state tournament.

"As a coach you're always greedy, and you want to get as many kids to state as you can," Roman Gutierrez said. "I thought we could take six to 10 guys so I'm pretty happy. We had some kids grow up this weekend."

Some of the wrestlers who were credited for "growing up" aren't going to state, but they came close. Juniors Jake Bricker and Josh Satterwhite, and sophomores Troy Vernon and Lyle Schaffner were one win away from a trip to state. They finished in the matches for fifth and sixth, with all but Schaffner winning fifth place.

"I was bummed not to make it to state, but it was a consolation to help the team win," Bricker said.

Satterwhite positioned himself to become the ninth Bulldog going to state with a wrestleback against Montrose's Brandon Franklin. Satterwhite led 5-0 in the second period when he threw Franklin to the mat, resulting in an injury to the Montrose wrestler. Franklin was unable to continue and won the match by an injury default.

Satterwhite's misfortune was one of the few setbacks of Saturday for the would-be regional champs.

Saturday morning delight

After Friday, Gutierrez said he hoped his wrestlers would come out less rigid Saturday morning.

If "less rigid" means winning matches, that is what they did.

Moffat County wrestlers finished 16-4 in the morning session, including five wins in the semifinals to put a handful of Bulldogs in the finals. First-round losers, junior Matt Kincheloe, Satterwhite, Schaffner, Bricker and Vernon, won two matches in the morning. The Bulldogs moved from third place to the tournament leaders by 40 points after the morning session.

The effort was to Gutierrez's delight.

"I thought we came out and wrestled a lot better in the morning," he said. "Some of the guys won some close matches to stay alive."

Junior Cory Vigil and seniors Navratil, Trenton Duarte, Jake Breslin and Brice Boling moved into the finals.

Holding off Palisade

In the afternoon session Palisade, the defending regional champs, made a run to get within 14 points of Moffat County going into the finals.

Moffat had the advantage over Palisade with 12 wrestlers still alive to their 10, but none of the championship matches for the Bulldogs were going to be easy. On paper it looked as if, just like the last two years, the regional title was going to be contested until the last match.

That was until Moffat County went 9-3 in the championship round to easily hold off last year's champs.

"Palisade made a hell of a run, which made it exciting," Gutierrez said. "But our guys didn't let up in their final matches."

Moffat had the championship wrapped up after senior Levi Weber won his match for third place in the 140-pound class.

The final scoring finished with Moffat earning 217 points, Palisade with 203 and Rifle with 189.

Icing on the cake

Some of the best wrestling of the night was still to come after Weber's win. Bricker and Satterwhite won fifth-place finishes with close overtime wins.

Navratil and Eagle Valley's Brendan Best had the marquee matchup of the night. The two wrestlers combined for a 67-1 record.

The match proved to be a showdown worthy of their records.

Each wrestler earned an escape in regulation to send it into overtime at 1-1. Neither wrestler scored in overtime so the match went into double overtime.

In double overtime, wrestlers start in referee's position, with two, 30-second periods allowing each wrestler to start on top and bottom.

In the first OT period Navratil held on to Best and didn't allow him to escape. In the second period Navratil escaped with 10 seconds remaining to earn a 2-1 win.

"He's tough," Navratil said of Best. "But the Navratil standup is tough to stop."

Great eight to state

Eight Bulldogs, including all five seniors to enter the regional tournament, travel Thursday to the state tournament at the Pepsi Center in Denver.

"It was nice that all of us could make it," said senior Trenton Duarte, who qualified for the first time. "We all get to go out together now."

They also brought the regional title back to Bulldogland.

"We wanted that back," Weber said. "Now it's time to go surprise some people at state."