Red Raider Wrestling team ‘back-to-back’ State Champions
Jerry E. Halmon, Sports Editor
With about a minute and
thirty eight seconds left in the
final match of the day at Dreher
High School, a smile came over
B-E Head Wrestling Coach
Cody Slaughter’s face. The 2011
Class 1-A Wrestling Coach of
the Year quite possibly was
thinking back to when he
accepted his present job as head
coach of a wrestling program at
B-E that had never won a state
championship, leaving a
powerhouse Gaffney High
School athletic program and
having some people there
question his sanity. Now with
back-to-back state
championships in his back
pocket after his young Red
Raider team (losing two quality
seniors in David Deleon and
Lane Walling ) defeated
Abbeville (52-23) in the 2012
Class A State Wrestling Finals
Saturday at Dreher High School
in Columbia. Slaughter does not
regret his decision one bit to
come back to his alma mater.
“After winning back to back
state champions, coming back to
Bamberg was definitely the right
choice,” a happy Coach
Slaughter said after his team’s
impressive win over the
Abbeville Panthers Saturday.
Slaughter noted that going
through the adversity of losing
in four previous state finals
made winning two in a row
special: “It feels good, we went
through a string of four straight
losses in state championships; so
coming back and winning the
second in a row feels real good,
and the kids are excited and
really happy, so that’s all that
really matters.
With a large contingency of
Red Raider fans cheering them
on in the Dreher High School
Gymnasium, the Red Raider
team got things rolling early
with Jeremy Davis (182) and
Mark Moody (170) recording
pins and giving the team a 12-0
lead. Coach Slaughter noted that
coming out early and setting the
tempo was a key in the match.
“Coming out we wanted to start
two of our better kids which
really set the tempo for the
match,” Slaughter said, adding
“things just rolled on after those
first pins.”
After two tough B-E losses,
B-E’s Miami of Ohio
commitment David Deleon
(285) would put the team back
up 18-15 in a grueling match
with a decision over his
opponent. After pins by
Malcolm Jones (113) and
Damion Johnson (120)
respectively, the Red Raiders
held a 27-18 advantage.
Following another tough loss by
the Red Raiders, Lan Hiers
(138) out pointed his opponent to
give the team a 31-23 cushion.
Three straight pins by Lane
Walling (145), Player Long
(170), Casey Jones (152) and a
win by DeVondree Williams
would send the Red Raider
faithful in chants of “back-to-back,
back-to-back” in the
Dreher High School Gym. It was
a total team effort for B-E with
Sean Paul Morais (195), Billy
Williams (220) and Anthony
Chandler (126) also putting up a
strong performance.
Coach Slaughter noted that
one of the keys to the success of
this year’s team was having a
number of wrestlers returning
from last year’s state
championship team. “They did a
really good job in those places
we expected them to. We had a
lot of young kids in the lineup,
but we had lots of sophomores
and juniors on last year’s team
that came back for us.” When
asked about this thoughts on the
team moving up to Class 2-A
next year after dominating Class
1-A the last two years Coach
Slaughter said: “We look
forward to the challenge in 2-A.
We think we can do as well in 2-A as we did in 1-A. We carry a
lot of kids with us, we’ll have a
lot of experience coming back.”
