The long bus ride to Evanston proved fruitful for the Powell Panther wrestling team, which finished fourth as a team while crowning two individual champions at the 3A West Regional tournament on Friday.

Jimmy Dees (37-9) was the first individual crowned champion for the Panthers at 195 pounds, finishing with four pins each in under 1:15 en route to his individual title.

“Jimmy had all first period pins and pinned a kid in the finals that he beat at Ron Thon that had given him fits,” coach Nick Fulton said. “That will put him in the state tournament as a No. 1 seed and he will take it one match at a time.”

Stetson Davis (37-2) continued his dominant season at 220 pounds, finishing with a win via a first period pin over Jace Grant in the championship match to claim his title.

His victory in the quarterfinal over Wyatt Barton gave Davis his 100th career win, joining an elite club few reach in Wyoming.

“It’s quite an accomplishment to get 100 wins in a career,” Fulton said. “It was nice to see a dominant performance over a quality kid [Grant]. He’s a pretty tough kid but Stetson controlled the match and did what he needed to do.”

Powell had one additional athlete in the finals on Friday, sending Gabriel Davis (29-11) to the championship bout at 106 pounds.

He came up just short, losing by pin in the second round to Lucas Todd of Green River.

Another top three finisher for the Panthers was Lannon Brazelton (15-21), who came in unseeded after moving down to 160 late in the season — losing to the eventual champion Brady Roberts in the quarterfinals before winning four straight matches to place third.

“We moved him down a weight and that has been a good thing,” Fulton said. “He wrestled really smart, he wasn’t seeded coming in and finished third. That sets him up in the state bracket really well.”

Powell had two placers at 285 pounds, with Doug Bettger (22-14) placing fourth and Zain Younas (13-11) finishing fifth to give Powell two wrestlers at that weight heading into state this weekend.

In addition to Davis winning 220 pounds, Jacob Eaton (10-7) placed fourth to give Powell two wrestlers heading into state at that weight.

Other placers included Wyatt Nicholson (17-13) finishing fifth at 106; Vinny Timmons (17-13) placing seventh at 126; Jeremy Harms (16-19) placing eighth at 145 pounds; Merced Jordan-Silva (9-12) placing sixth at 170; Dusty Carter (12-17) placing seventh at 170; Denton Wainscott (11-10) placing fifth at 182 and Dillon Melton (22-15) placing seventh at 182 pounds.

“It was nice to have some of our second guys in there knocking guys off and taking team points,” Fulton said.

Other Panthers at the regional tournament included Tyler Wenzel (5-10) going 0-2 at 113 pounds; Kaiden Apodaca (5-9) going 0-2 at 113 pounds; Weston Tomas (21-19) going 1-2 at 120 pounds; Wyatt Heffington (7-13) going 2-2 at 132 pounds; Patrick Haney (19-19) going 2-2 at 132 pounds; Drew Valdez (12-23) going 1-2 at 138 pounds; Mitchel Wainscott (13-13) going 2-2 at 138 pounds; Chase Visocky (6-3) going 0-2 at 145 pounds; Jack Van Norman (16-23) going 0-2 at 152 pounds; Rhys Bray (2-2) going 2-2 at 152 pounds and Baylor Harvison (0-2) going 0-2 at 160 pounds.

In the team standings Powell finished with 165.5 points to take home fourth, while Green River finished with 233.5 points to take the team title.

Prior to the regional tournament, the Panther girls made their way to Lyman on Thursday, taking part in the Lyman Invitational due to there not being a regional tournament established in the first year of competition for girls’ wrestling.

Allison LeBlanc placed third at 110 pounds while Yessenia Teague placed third at 125 pounds.

“They wrestled real well there, we wanted to get them some mat time before state,” Fulton said. 

STATE TOURNAMENT

This year’s state tournament will kick off one day earlier than usual, beginning on Thursday with the girls’ brackets kicking off its inaugural tournament at 9:30 a.m. at the Ford Wyoming Center in Casper.

“Yessenia and Allison are getting better,” Fulton said. “Yessenia has been dominant all year, and Allison is on an upward trend right now. It would sure be nice at the first all-girls state tournament to come out of there with a couple of winners.”

The boys tournament will then kick off on Friday at 9 a.m. with matches throughout the day. The girls’ finals will be Friday night, and boys’ finishing on Saturday.

“They have been a good group, we are looking forward to taking them to Casper,” Fulton said. “We will get them ready to go and get out there and wrestle.”

For the team standings the Panthers are expected to be in the mix with a host of teams battling out for the top seven spots at the state tournament.