Camden Hills rolls to another title

BELFAST – Question: what do the Camden Hills wrestling team and NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon have in common?

Answer: both the Windjammers and Gordon just keep on winning. And because of that, Camden Hills is the team Class B wrestling fans love to cheer against. Like, for example, when Medomak Valley of Waldoboro’s Bryan Blackler wrestled Isaac Read of Camden Hills in the championship final of the 130-pound weight class during Saturday’s Eastern Maine Class B championship.

As soon as Blackler pinned Read, fans in the Belfast High gym erupted in cheers and applause.

The Camden Hills wrestlers don’t much care if you like them or not. The Windjammers are more focused on winning than listening to the partisan crowd – Camden racked up 233 points Saturday to win their eighth straight Eastern Maine title. The ‘Jammers will defend their 2001 Class B state championship at this week’s state meet.

“[The crowds have] been doing it for years,” said senior captain Sam Glover, who picked up his first individual EM title this year. “Personally, I kind of like it. It’s a little bit of motivation.”

Belfast coach Neal Wood just wanted his Lions to stay close to the Windjammers, and indeed Belfast claimed runner-up honors with 199 points. Winslow was third with 1341/2 points, Caribou took fourth (761/2) and Ellsworth was fifth (731/2).

The top four wrestlers in each weight class advance to the state championships, which will start Friday and run through Saturday at the Bangor Auditorium.

Camden and Belfast dominated the 14-match championship final round: the Lions won six bouts and the Windjammers took five.

Glover earned his first-ever bid to the state championships when he earned an 11-5 decision over No. 1 seed and previously undefeated Lucas Brewer of Hermon. Glover hadn’t wrestled Brewer in the regular season.

“I was just going to wrestle confident, do my best and see what I was going to do,” said Glover, who was injured at the Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference meet last year, which took him out of the regional and state meets as well.

Camden Hills sophomore Bryan Creamer picked up a big win at 189 when he earned a 6-5 decision in the second overtime period. Creamer, who was dealing with the flu and had thrown up Saturday morning, had to go up against MDI’s Chris Perry, the top seed.

Perry took a 2-1 lead after the first two-minute round and was ahead 4-2 into the second when Creamer tied it at 4-4. He went up 5-4 in the third round, Perry tied it to send it into overtime, and after a scoreless two-minute overtime, Creamer ended it when he picked up a point four seconds into the 30-second double overtime.

“He had started to take me down and I got behind him, and once I got behind him I got two points,” Creamer said of his comeback during the second round that got him back into the match. “My coaches told me to wrestle smart and wrestle my own match.”

Creamer has been involved in three overtime matches this year, and is used to coming from behind.

“I’m not a real offensive wrestler,” he said.

Camden Hills’ Jake Rollins won the 103 title with a pin of Old Town’s Blake Mishou. Windjammer Levi Rollins pinned Matt Burns of Ellsworth for the 125 crown. Chris Remsen of Camden claimed first place at 135 when he pinned Derek Folsom of Winslow.

Cal Pease (171) and Nathaniel Boehmer (152) picked up consolation wins for Camden Hills. All told the Windjammers will send 12 wrestlers to states.

“We did well,” Camden coach John Kelly said. “We knocked off a lot of kids who were higher-seeded than we were. We were in a lot of close matches that we ended up pulling out in the end because of some conditioning.”

The Lions had beaten the Windjammers 41-38 in a dual meet during the regular season, but Wood was pleased with the 24-point difference Saturday.

“We just went the extra mile this week to get the pins, to get the extra points and keep that gap closed, and it worked pretty well,” he said.

Belfast’s Eastern Maine winners included Mike Ames at 112, Norman Gilmore at 119, Dustin Armstrong at 145 (Armstrong, the No. 2 seed, beat No. 5 Andrew Ripley of Medomak Valley in the final), Nick Ouimet at 152, Eric Wagner at 171, and Devin Potvin at 215.

Belfast’s freshmen had a fine afternoon, especially Gilmore, who was the third seed. Gilmore pinned MCI of Pittsfield’s David Cavanaugh, the eighth seed who had knocked off No. 1 Tom Burns of Ellsworth in the first round.

“Norman did a phenomenal job today,” Wood said. “We didn’t expect him to be a champion, but he stepped it up and wrestled the best he has all year. … We had three freshman [Gilmore, Kyle Bonin at 103 and Dunham at 135] place today and go on to states.”

Winslow’s Dan Stace pinned Joe Zak of Camden Hills for the 140 title. Jon Judkins of Caribou earned an 8-7 decision over Winslow’s Dan Burke at 275.