HOWLAND – Early this season, the prospect of a fifth straight regional wrestling title wasn’t bright for the Foxcroft Academy Ponies.

Losses due to graduation and injuries had just about everyone thinking – even late into the season – this would be the year the Ponies would be dethroned.

But a funny thing happened on the way to Saturday’s runner-up trophy presentation at Sereyko Gym. An improbable comeback by a senior leader and an inspirational effort by a junior fired up Foxcroft and ignited a championship finals effort that carried the Ponies to yet another Eastern Maine Class C championship.

Chris Steinke and Kaleb Mann led a charge that resulted in four of six Foxcroft championship finalists winning their matches and spurring the Ponies to 160 points, eight points ahead of Dexter, which was runner-up for a second straight year. The next two spots were also repeaters as Bucksport was third with 1241/2 points and host Penobscot Valley scored 113 to finish fourth for the sixth straight year.

Steinke and Mann were profiles in courage and determination, respectively. Actually, you could argue Steinke was both.

“Steinke just being here today made a difference, I thought,” said Dexter coach Adam Gudroe.

The Ponies’ multi-sport athlete came back from what was thought to be a season-ending shoulder injury suffered in the season’s opening week to not only wrestle Saturday but win.

“We thought it was over. He came in the next morning after re-injuring it and he was fighting back tears while telling us he couldn’t go,” said FA coach Luis Ayala. “He kept working out with the team, but we never knew if he’d be able to come back. Then the week of PVCs, he said he’d give it a try. As it turned out, we needed him.

“That shows how much he cares about this team because any type of injury he had would be career-threatening and he’d have to have surgery again. He has literally put himself on the line for the team.”

It was Ayala who unwittingly inspired the comeback with an offhand remark he made to Steinke.

“Two Thursdays ago, I was lifting weights and coach kind of jokingly said, ‘You could make 145 next week, right?'” said Steinke, who was wrestling at 152 pounds this season after missing all of last season to a similar injury and the resulting surgery. “I had to lose 10 pounds in about five days or so, so I went at it, ate right, drank a lot of protein shakes, and today everything just came together right for me, the team, everything.”

Steinke won his first match via pin, then eked out a 9-8 decision in the semifinals over Calvary Chapel of Orrington’s River Robertson before edging Bucksport’s Shaun Powell 9-7 in the championship.

“You could definitely tell today I haven’t been wrestling the whole season because the first match, I was strong. The next couple? I was dead,” he said.

Steinke’s win came on the heels of Mann’s gut-check win at 119 over top seed and PVHS senior Aaron Gagnon.

“He’d never beaten the kid from Howland all through middle school and high school,” Ayala said. “We had six kids in the finals and I was thinking two kids would win, so that set the tone for us.”

Mann, the No. 2 seed, pinned Gagnon in 4 minutes, 56 seconds with Gagnon leading 8-5 in points with 1:04 left in the final period.

“It was huge. It was an inspiration to the whole team. Everybody was jumping up,” said Steinke.

“That was probably one of my hardest matches all season,” said Mann.

It came down to one mistake.

“He reached back and I threw him over and that was key,” Mann explained. “I concentrated on my feet and worked really hard. On every one of his shoot-ins, I’d hit him with a hard cross-face and it was all about keeping my hips tight.”

Other individual champs from Foxcroft were senior Tim Fogg at 135 and senior Jerrod Rideout at 160.

The rest of the individual champions were: Beau Gagnon of Penobscot Valley at 103; Calais’ Scott Carpenter at 112 and John Hatt at 285; Curtis Lozier of Fort Kent at 125; Dexter’s Ronnie Harvey (130), Josh Harvey (152), Doug Richardson (189) and Lee Morgan (215); and Bucksport’s Ray Wood (140) and Jon Pelletier (171).

Heading into the consolation (third-place) finals, Dexter trailed Foxcroft by just seven points, but afterward, the Tigers were eight down.

“We thought, going into the consolation finals, there was a chance for us, because we went from being 30 points down to seven, but they got some big performances out of their guys,” said Gudroe.

Coach Gerald Hutchinson’s PVHS Howlers squad also got big efforts from an injured squad.

“My 112 had an injury and he would have placed,” Hutchinson said. “My 125, who’s also injured, would have placed, and my 189 is the only guy who’s beaten Richardson, but he dislocated his shoulder and he’s done for the year.”

Still, Hutchinson is optimistic his team can end its fourth-place finish streak next year.

“I only lose two guys and we have a bunch of eighth-graders coming in,” he said. “We’re in good shape.”

aneff@bangordailynews.net

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