By Bob Sutton
Special to The Alamance News
During the chaos of the state finals of the high school wrestling tournament Saturday night, Southeast Alamance’s Judah Robinson had a different response when his season ended.
He was unfazed by his unfortunate result, taking it in stride and offering an uplifting message.
“I was still proud of myself,” Robinson said after an 8-4 loss to Enka’s Maddox Crooke in the 106-pound Class 5-A championship bout at First Horizon Coliseum in Greensboro.
Robinson, a senior, is a two-time state qualifier – and more than that.
“This was still making history as the school’s first finalist,” he said, referring to the boys’ team at Southeast.
Robinson carried a brief 4-3 lead into the final 40 seconds of the first period. While there were a couple of sequences when Robinson threatened to make a scoring move, he didn’t quite finish those against Crooke despite the encouragement from supporters occupying the front few rows of a section in the coliseum.
“He couldn’t make the adjustment,” Southeast coach Grant Gibson said. “There were some things there, but he it was a tough match.”
Throughout the multi-hour championship session, the scenes were largely defined by pure elation on one side and extreme despair on the other. So Robinson’s departure from the latter despite the outcome of his match perhaps made him stand out in a different way.
Afterward, he swelled with pride – and also took interest in the next weight division’s round of finals because he knew several of those finalists from other schools from spending time on the state’s wrestling circuit.
Robinson had a certain perspective as well. A neck injury prior to Christmas threatened to derail his season.
He recovered from that, yet encountered defeats along the way as his postseason prospects wavered.
“But I figured it out,” he said.
That made Gibson appreciate Robinson’s efforts.
“He killed it,” Gibson said. “He’s exactly the kind of person and wrestler we want in our (wrestling) room.”
Robinson was Southeast’s first-ever place finisher last season when he was sixth. This season with an increase in classifications and new tournament format, only the top four in each classification’s weight class are awarded.
Robinson was one of them.
“I got a medal this time,” he said. “We still made progress.”
Robinson began Friday’s competition with a pin of Smoky Mountain’s Landon Mantz in 5:08 and followed that with a 13-7 decision against West Carteret’s Jonathan Helbert in the semifinals.
Other results
Aside from Robinson and Western Alamance’s Omar Rushing, other Alamance County entrants lost their Friday matches and then were slotted for Saturday’s consolation rounds.
James Stephens of West Rowan came back from a 4-0 deficit to defeat Rushing in the 132-pound semifinals in Class 5-A on Friday. Rushing won his first-round match by 11-3 against Enka’s Colson Stroupe. Rushing forfeited in Saturday’s consolation round.
Western’s Gavin Smith lost by a first-period pin to Jamal Hall of East Rowan in the 138 first round.
Smith responded in the consolation bracket to pin Montgomery Central’s Jerry Ceraphin in 1:38 before losing by technical fall to West Rowan’s Chris Gaither.
Eastern Alamance 126-pounder Elijah Watson dropped a 12-2 decision to North Gaston’s Louis Scott. Watson didn’t compete in the consolation round.
- In Class 6-A, Southern Alamance heavyweight Luke White lost 5-2 to Davante Johnson of St. Stephens in the first round.
White defeated Fayetteville Seventy-First’s Kenan Howard 4-1 in the first consolation round before losing by a third-period pin to Charlotte Caholic’s Dom Basrawala.
