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Raiders Get To Wrestle More

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By DAREK SHARP

dsharp@tampatrib.com

Published: December 31, 2008

PLANT CITY - Six of one has not been a half-dozen of the other for the Plant City High wrestling team this year.

The Raiders, as have many Hillsborough County squads, are taking a different and by all counts much better approach to scheduling meets this season. Instead of a slate filled with dual meets where two schools square off, the Raiders are loading up on multiteam events.

A popular format, the six-way meet, has given the Raiders a great chance to wrestle more.

"Especially for the younger guys, it's been great," Raider wrestling coach Nick Ferrario said. "When it comes to districts and hopefully beyond that, you're probably going to have to wrestle five times in a day. This definitely gets the guys used to being in the gym all day."

One big benefit of a six-way meet is it only counts as two weigh-ins. A team is limited to 18 "weigh-in" events for the season, and each dual meet counts as one. While six separate dual meets would obviously count for six events, that number is sliced significantly with the six-way meet allowing for a fuller schedule.

And the Raiders have been doing pretty well in them, going 3-2 in events at Wharton and Brandon.

At their own invitational tournament featuring eight schools, the Raiders finished as champions despite not winning their pool. Hillsborough beat Plant City by two points, but the Raiders qualified for the semifinals by finishing as the pool runner-up, then knocked off opposite pool winner Armwood.

Then Plant City beat Mulberry, which itself scored an upset of Hillsborough, 48-36, to win the title.

"That worked out perfectly for us also," Ferrario said. "We had five matches and none of them were against the same team, which could have happened, unlike in the six-ways where you know there are five different opponents."

The Raider Invitational was held Dec. 13.

Plant City's top wrestlers are not a surprise, as returning state tourney qualifier Travis Vollick is off to an 8-0 start. He sat out the first couple of weeks with a knee injury but is back at full health.

Fellow senior Colby Clark, who reached the regional tournament last season, is 13-2 with his lone losses to wrestlers from Brandon and Alonso. Another senior, 112-pounder Josh Creamer, is 12-1.

"He has more maturity and maybe toughness than a lot of 112-pounders because there just aren't that many seniors at that weight," Ferrario said.

Eddie Rosenbaum, one of several Raider wrestlers who also played for the football team (he participated in the Hillsborough County All-Star Game), is 6-1. He joined the club after the all-star contest.

Ferrario said first-year Raider football coach Jason Strunk, who like him comes from the wrestling-tradition rich state of Pennsylvania, has been very helpful in encouraging his players to wrestle.

One example is freshman Derek McDonald, who has never wrestled before but was sold on the sport and has gotten off to a nice start. Another strong freshman so far has been Will Joyce, though don't look for him on the football field.

"He weighs 99 pounds. I think I'm going to try and keep him to wrestling only," Ferrario said.

Plant City is hosting its own six-way event when it returns to action Jan. 10. The Raiders will host Blake, Chamberlain, Freedom, Leto and rival Durant. Wrestling will begin at 11 a.m. and go throughout the day; the Plant City-Durant matchup will be scheduled for the final match.

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