BY CLIFF SMELLEY
Lake Butler Middle School’s wrestling team competed in the North Florida Championships on Feb. 1 in Lake City, with Kyson Waters winning the 85-pound class title.
Waters, who was coming off a Suwannee Middle Athletic Conference championship, went 3-0. He pinned Oakleaf’s Easton Phillips in 16 seconds and then pinned Lake Asbury’s Layne Harrell in 1:29, which put him in the championship match against Lake City’s Isaiah Wiley. Waters won by another pin, getting the victory in 2:10.
He was one of two Lake Butler wrestlers to place. James Crew took fourth in the 215 class. After getting pinned by Wakulla’s Kadyn Reynolds in 4:26, Crew bounced back with a 17-1 win by technical fall over Wilkinson’s Josiah Potts. Crew advanced to the third-place match off a win by disqualification over River Springs’ Ty’Ler Williams. He faced Wakulla’s Reynolds again, losing 10-9.
The Tigers’ Landon Douglas (126 class) earned three wins in the tournament before being eliminated in the consolation semifinals.
Lake Butler’s Carson Rogers (80) had two wins, while the Tigers got one win each from Winston Sparkman (90), Mason Vandervort (106) and Isaiah Cepeda (150).
