Youth wrestling: Homer Junior High wins state title

When a wrestling team has the largest number of state qualifiers and then receives scoring from most of those competitors, along with several medals, there’s a pretty good chance they’ll have a great opportunity to claim a state championship.

That’s just what Homer Junior High School was able to accomplish this past weekend when it took part in the Illinois Elementary School Association’s finals in DeKalb.

Coach David Rush’s Mustangs received scoring from all but four of their 18 qualifiers, won two titles and had another finalist to go along with two other medal winners as it beat DeKalb Huntley, 163-135, for top honors in the event at Northern Illinois University.

A year ago, DeKalb Huntley beat Homer, 159-127, for first place in the competition. But after the two teams split in dual meets this season, the Mustangs prevailed at the state finals to capture the program’s first state title since 2013 and its second championship overall, becoming only the ninth school in IESA history to claim multiple state titles in the sport.

Winning titles were eighth-graders Keegan Roberson (112 pounds) and Drew Blackburn-Forst (167), while seventh-grader Brian Parker (85) took second place. Eighth-grader Peter Kontonis (275) finished third, and fifth-grader Payton Roberson (70), Keegan’s brother, took fifth.

Other qualifiers were eighth-graders Alvaro Alvarez (135), Michael Holland (155), Paulie Kadlec (105), Moe Khalil (145), Tommy Mula (135), Paul Rasp (119) and Cody Silzer (126); seventh-graders Jad Alwawi (80), Logan Kaminski (85) and Ben Markham (70); sixth-graders Tommy Drogemuller (95) and Max Knezevich (75); and fifth- grader Matt Giorgetti (65).

Rush, who has led the Mustangs throughout their 13-year history, was assisted this season by Paul Oster, Kenton Brace, Jared McCarthy, Jimmy Roberson and Chris Myers.

“After losing to DeKalb Huntley last year, we looked at it as if we had to reload and get better, since we knew that we had a lot of kids coming back,” Rush said. “But we also had a lot of eighth-graders who stepped up and were state qualifiers and won matches downstate. We looked at DeKalb as our rivals and wrestled them twice, and they beat us in DeKalb and we beat them in the Mid-State Duals title. We knew once we beat them that we had a shot.

“We had 18 qualifiers as well as a lot of placewinners. Some of the kids who won two or three matches but didn’t place were the extra 28 points that we won by. And we have a good team coming back next year with eight qualifiers returning, and we have a lot of kids back who couldn’t make it to state. Hopefully we can continue the success we’ve had in our 13 years when we’ve won six state trophies, seven sectionals and 11 straight regional titles. We always want to make sure that we’re winning regionals, winning sectionals and hopefully competing for a trophy, and as good as we were this year, we wanted to win state.”

Keegan Roberson (46-0) became the program’s second two-time champion, joining Abdullah Assaf, who claimed firsts in both 2012 and 2013. In the title match, he won by technical fall in 3:08 over Camp Point Central’s Matthew Williamson. During the year he also beat the 105 champ, Harvard’s Nikolas Jimenez, and the 119 champion, Sterling Challand’s Drew Kested.

“It was fun,” Roberson said. “We felt good since we had 18 guys going to state. The first day at state we didn’t do that good, but on the second day, Drew, Brian and I got to the finals.”

Blackburn-Forst recorded four quick falls to capture his title. In the finals, he needed just 22 seconds to pin Glenside’s Philip Dozier to set a new state finals record at his weight class. It also avenged a pair of losses that he suffered to Dozier during the season. In addition, he defeated the 185-pound champion during the season, Bloomington’s Jack Weltha.

“Last year at state was pretty much for fun, and I took sixth place,” Blackburn-Forst said. “But this year I was worried since there was a lot more expected of me, but I was pushed a lot by my coaches and by my family, so this was a really good experience. I was a little upset on our first day, since the team and I didn’t wrestle that well. But on the second day, I wrestled way better than the first and in my finals match, I wrestled great, since I pinned a kid in 22 seconds to beat the record. I liked how we wrestled together as a team and with heart.”