Keith Johnson

Quinton Antoine struggles to escape the hold of Palmetto Ridge wrestler Anthony Phillips. Phillips defeated Antoine in the Class 2A District 12 tournament finals to win the 135-pound weight class.

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Prior to last week’s 2A-12 District meet, first-year head coach Tige Thompson took his team away to compete in different invitational tournaments, skipping the Collier County Athletic Conference meet in an effort to get his team better prepared for districts.

Whether or not that strategy paid off is open for debate.

Lely finished in third place overall, and placed nine wrestlers who will all be moving on to regionals, but the thing that irked Thompson was that all four of his wrestlers in their respective weight class finals all lost.

Certainly getting over that hump is something the team will be working on when preparing for the regional tournament.

“Some of our finals didn’t turn out the way we were hoping, and we had some brand-new matches against some Palmetto guys,” Thompson said. “Louga’s (Isme) loss to Charlie Fox was his third loss to him this season, and unfortunately he has a mental block there.”

Meanwhile, Thompson has been satisfied with the progress his wrestlers have made since he took over.

“We have a very young team, we’re only losing one senior, we only have four juniors also,” he said. “We were laughing at Gulf Coast the other week because they said at the Gary Freis Invitational that in ten years they haven’t lost to Lely, well here you go now – we got you in the district tournament.”