“Nall, Roe off to regionals”

"Brandon Nall and Mike Roe both placed third in last Saturday's Olympic/Pierce County League wrestling tournament to advance to this Saturday's regionals in Ellensburg.Jacob Hayashi was the only other Spartan to place, finishing sixth. With three wrestlers absent due to illness or injury and no heavyweight entry, the Spartans finished ninth among the 10 teams. "

“Brandon Nall and Mike Roe both placed third in last Saturday’s Olympic/Pierce County League wrestling tournament to advance to this Saturday’s regionals in Ellensburg.Jacob Hayashi was the only other Spartan to place, finishing sixth. With three wrestlers absent due to illness or injury and no heavyweight entry, the Spartans finished ninth among the 10 teams.Nall, wrestling at 135, opened with a fall at 2:38 and 9-4 decision before losing 4-2 in the semis. He came back with a third-round fall in the consolation round to face Jesse Hendrix of Lakes for third. After a scoreless opening round, Nall opened a 4-2 advantage on the strength of two takedowns. Beginning the third round in the down position, he escaped, suffered a takedown, and escaped again for a 6-4 triumph.Roe (140) had a fall at :59 and 8-0 decision in his first two matches, then dropped an 11-8 decision in the semis. He recorded a third-round fall in his consolation match after leading 12-2 and faced longtime foe and second-seed Aaron Gambel of Sequim for third. The first round was scoreless, then Roe scored a two-point near-fall during the second round to lead 2-0 going into the final two minutes. He received a somewhat mystifying one-point stall penalty, scored a reversal for a 4-1 lead, but gave up a point for an illegal hold and Gambel scored a reversal to tie the match. With less than 30 seconds left, Roe escaped for a vital point and a 5-4 decision.Hayashi (152) opened with a fall at 3:50 before losing a 7-6 decision in his second match. He won a 12-2 decision, and followed that with a fall before losing 16-10 in the third place match. A 5-1 loss in his final match dropped him to sixth.Travis Dever (125) and Derek Jones (130) both won two matches.John-Michael King (119), Brian Cook (171), Seth Paradox (189), and Nick McCallum (215) all won one match.I thought all four seniors (Nall, Roe, Dever, and Joey Mankes) had a reasonable chance, coach Steve Hohl said. But Mankes injured his shoulder against North Kitsap and couldn’t get medical clearance to wrestle, while Dever fell behind 5-0 in the match he needed to win in order to compete for third place and could only get as close as 7-4.There were some nice surprises, Hohl said. DJ (Jones) went two and two and Brian Cook had a good tournament.If Roe and Nall finish in the top four in this Saturday’s eight-man tournament, they’ll advance to the state meet – Mat Classic XI – the following weekend in Tacoma.Tumblers get snubs at subsBainbridge placed second in Saturday’s sub-district gymnastics meet, aka Seattle’s Metro League championships, but you never would have known it by the awards ceremony. For the second year in a row, the Spartans were snubbed in the official standings and denied public recognition of awards, and it took a mixture of cajoling and complaining by coach Cindy Guy to even come home with a partial set of results.Those results showed Ballard winning with 155.075 with the Spartans second with 146.725. That effort was good enough to advance them as a team to district competition Saturday at Sammamish High School.The problem arises because Bainbridge is the only 3A team in District 3 with a gymnastics program. While it might seem simpler to advance them directly to this week’s competition – which happens at the 4A level with North Kitsap and Port Angeles – Metro has been forced to accept Bainbridge into their league championships, which also serves as district qualifying and the top two teams advance. That means that one Metro team – in this case, Nathan Hale – is precluded from going as a team, perhaps explaining the rancor.With Bainbridge joining Metro next year, the Spartans will no longer be interlopers.But right now I don’t feel very warm and fuzzy toward Metro, Guy said. Despite the chilly atmosphere, junior Stephanie Hylen scored a season best 34.075 in all-around, good for second place. Hylen recorded a school-record 9.25 in beam for second place in the competition, was third in bars (7.45), third in floor (8.675), and second in vault (8.7).Amy Glover was one of just two other Spartans to place. Doing a novice routine on bars because of a bad back, she still scored 7.5 to place second. Darby Cahill’s 8.0 on beam was good for fourth. Joining Hylen, Glover and Cahill at the district meet are Valerie Henshaw, Alison Kramer, Melissa Borgen, Liz Darley, Nicole Bemis, Pam LeGendre and Jacque Alonso. “