By Todd Lancaster
JEFFERSONVILLE — Washington will have one wrestler advance to Saturday’s semistate at Robert’s Stadium next Saturday.
Freddy Nelson earned runner-up honors with a pair of wins in his 171 lb. weight class at the Jeffersonville Regional on Saturday.
Nelson, beat Ethan Bowman of Charleston, 7-2 followed by a win over Salem, 14-1 in the semis. He was finally defeated by the state’s No. 7 wrestler, Caleb Browner of Jeffersonville with a first-period pin.
“Freddy has really stepped it up this year. He has improved 10-fold from where he was as a sophomore,” said WHS coach John Thompson. “This was really the best he has wrestled all season. He will wrestle the third-place wrestler from one of the other regionals, but we are not sure who that will be yet.”
Washington had three other who qualified for regional, unfortunately, Leo Meza was unable to compete due to illness.
“He had pneumonia and the doctor would not release him. I hated to see his season end like that, because he really wanted to wrestle,” added Thompson.
Freshman Levi Graber lost his opening match at 103 lbs. to Matt LaHue of Corydon, with a first period pin. Raulie Velazquez lost his 130 lb. match, to Floyd Central’s Aaron Witt, 8-2.
“Levi is just a freshman and has great potential. I expect great things from him,” said Thomson. “Raulie wrestled a very good senior, he just made a couple of mistakes. He has the desire to make a deep run next year. He said he was going to start getting ready for next year, starting today.”
