Douglas wrestlers strong at state

Douglas senior Tony Ferris came back from a tough draw at the Northern 4A Regionals last week to wrap up his high school career as the state runner-up in the 189-pound weight class at the NIAA 4A State Championships in Las Vegas over the weekend.

Ferris was coming off a third-place finish at regionals where he suffered a surprising early-round loss to a wrestler who didn't end up qualifying for state.

Ferris had to start off in the pig-tail match to even get into the state tournament bracket, but pinned Mojave's Trey McElhaney in 3:23 to advance.

From there, Ferris scored a major decision over Green Valley's Vince Pezutto and took a 7-2 decision over Silverado's Brent Reed to advance to the state title match.

Ferris was pitted against Reed's Brandon Gebhardt, a pairing that many thought would also be the previous week's regional title match. Gebhardt prevailed 10-3 to take the title.

Also for Douglas, 135-pound regional champ C.J. Wynar, also a senior, finished fourth.

Wynar opened with a pin in 3:05 against Silverado's Mark Wagner, but lost a 9-2 decision to Cimarron-Memorial's Nick Harris to drop into the consolation bracket.

Wynar took a major decision over Damonte's Michael Artemis before losing to Manogue's Ricky McDonald 4-1 in the third-place match.

In the 130-pound bracket, Douglas' Nico Barker lost in the opening round to eventual state champ Jake Evans of Mojave but came back to pin Carson's Todd Banko in the consolation bracket.

Northern 4A Regional champ Jeremy Wilson of Galena then pinned Barker to move on to the third-place match

In the team standings, Mojave took the team title, followed by Damonte Ranch, Cimarron-Memorial and Fallon.

Douglas finished eighth.