Yesterday February 8^th the Tuscarora Titans hosted the wrestling regional dual tournament with the South Hagerstown, Manchester Valley, and Linganore High School. After a great season this year, the best season in recent history for the wrestling team, the Titans where ready to show just how good they were this year at last night’s regional dual matches. It was clear in every one of the wrestler’s minds that they had a chance to make school history and that’s just what they did albeit the team did not come out unscathed.

The first round of the competition saw the Titans go up against old foe South Hagerstown while the Linganore Lancers fought Manchester Valley. The matches started at 285lbs.  and went back and forth a little bit between the teams until they got to 132lbs. At 132 lbs. the titans sent out Paul Kirkpatrick but sadly the match didn’t go as planned. During the match as the South Hagerstown wrestler was trying to stack Paul he in avertedly situated Paul’s body in a position where all of his weight was resting on his neck instead of on the top of his shoulders. Without intending to the S.H. wrestler ended up seriously injuring Paul as he applied more pressure to try to pin him. Paul screamed it in pain, his opponent immediately let go, and within 20 minutes Paul was sadly taken out on a stretcher and to a local hospital to have his injury assessed. For the Titans winning the competition now wasn’t just to make history, but rather for their injured teammate.

After Paul was taken out the Titans and South Hagerstown collected themselves and got back to wrestling. Tuscarora won the match and both teams moved on to observe the other match to see who the Titans would face. The Lancers tied against Manchester Valley and after going through a checklist of criteria the officials decided it would be the Lancers who were to face the Titans. After the secondary mat was moved and the other mat was re-centered the wrestling began. In an unexpected turn of events first year wrestler Benjamin Locket at 108 lbs. was able to pin his opponent. The entire team was ecstatic and ready to dominate for the rest of match. After a couple of more matches, some of which included forfeits, the score was 33 to the Titans and 23 to the Lancers. Then came the match at 172 that decided the night. A.J. Lyons went out to face his opponent from Linganore. In yet another unexpected turn of events A.J. was able to pin his opponent to the great cheer of the rest of the team. The night was won. After two more matches the final score was 45 29, Titans. The Wrestling team made history, the first team from Tuscarora to win the regional dual tournament. For the first time the Tuscarora Titans are headed to the wrestling team state competition.