Saturday’s high school wrestling state championships will feature a trio of themes involving threes.

Competition will be held in three divisions, with Class A Massabesic of Waterboro, Class B Camden Hills of Rockport and Class C Dirigo of Dixfield all defending champions who face major challenges to that status.

Unlike in recent years, the state meet will be held in three locations: Class A at Cony High School in Augusta, Class B at Mountain Valley High School in Rumford and Class C at Foxcroft Academy in Dover-Foxcroft. Competition is scheduled to begin at 9:30 a.m. at each site.

Until this year an all-class state meet was rotated on an annual basis between the Augusta Civic Center and the Bangor Auditorium, but the Maine Principals’ Association opted this year to go to a three-site format instead of dealing with crowded conditions at the Bangor site that forced the meet to be spread out over two days.

Next year’s meet will return to the Augusta Civic Center.

And three individual wrestlers: Jerod Rideout of Foxcroft, Chris Smith of Deering of Portland and Jon Hussey of Marshwood of South Berwick, will attempt to join an elite group of Mainers who have won four consecutive individual state championships.

Rideout has bounced back from an injury suffered while helping Foxcroft win the 2007 Class C football state title to win Penobscot Valley Conference and Eastern Maine Class C championships at 160 pounds with little difficulty. He will attempt to cap off his senior season by adding one more state title to his wrestling resume on his home mat.

Smith (119 pounds) and Hussey (160) are participating in the Class A meet, and they will seek to join eight other Maine wrestlers as four-time state champions, most recently Jeremiah Barkac of Dexter (2004-07). Other four-time champs are Chris Barkac of Dexter (2002-05), Chris Remsen of Camden Hills (2001-04), Tim Boetsch of Camden-Rockport (1996-99), Matt Lindsay of Penobscot Valley of Howland (1995-98) and Mike Caramihalis (1977-80), Conrad Turgeon (1963-66) and Reggie Monroe (1962-65), all of Sanford.

Perhaps the most competitive of the three state meets will come in Class B, where Belfast is in search of its first championship since winning back-to-back crowns in 1994 and 1995.

The Lions are coming off a strong performance last weekend, when they ended Camden Hills’ 13-year reign as Eastern Maine champion. Eleven Belfast wrestlers qualified for the state meet, led by EM individual champions Josh Robbins (119), Jimmy Spencer (140), Kote Aldus (160), Mike Rolerson (171) and Travis Spencer (189).

Camden Hills will send eight wrestlers to states, led by regional winners Murphy McGowan (130) and Jacob Berry (145).

The Western B representatives will be led by regional champion Mountain Valley, which not only will have a meet-high 12 competitors but also the home-mat advantage. The Falcons’ contingent features four regional champs in Ernie Matthews (130), Derek Sicotte (140), Taylor Bradley (152) and Eddie Estes (160).

York High School, the Western B runner-up, will have 11 wrestlers in the meet, while Wells will have a 10-wrestler delegation.

In Class C, Foxcroft Academy is peaking late in the season en route to winning the Penobscot Valley Conference title two weeks ago and its fifth straight Eastern Maine crown Saturday.

Led by Rideout, the Ponies crowned four regional champions, including Kaleb Mann (119), Tim Fogg (135) and Chris Steinke (145).

But defending state champion Dirigo and Lisbon, last year’s runner-up, are seen as the two favorites to battle it out for the title. Dirigo defeated Lisbon 194-171 in last weekend’s Western C meet, avenging a 152-144 loss to the Greyhounds in the Mid-State Conference championships a week earlier – a meet in which Mountain Valley, Wells and York finished third through fifth.

While Foxcroft will have eight wrestlers participating in the state meet, Dirigo will be represented by competitors in all 14 weight classes after winning last weekend’s Western C meet, while Lisbon will have 12 participants.

Regional champions representing Dirigo at the state meet are Derek Daley (135), Jon Smith (145), Josh Palmer (160) and James Olsen (171). Western C winners from Lisbon are Forrest Cornell (103), Josh Pomerleau (112), Matt Nicholson (119), Marcus Bubar (140), Cam Bubar (152) and Joe Doughty (215).

Dexter, which finished second to Foxcroft in both the PVCs and Eastern Maine meet, will have nine wrestlers at the states, including regional champions Ronnie (130) and Josh (152) Harvey, Doug Richardson (189) and Lee Morgan (215).

In Class A, Massabesic looms as the favorite to defend its title after topping rival Noble of North Berwick 218-150.5 in the Western Maine regional. The Mustangs crowned five individual champions at that meet and have qualified 11 wrestlers for states compared to nine for Noble.

Skowhegan emerged from a tightly bunched Eastern A field to win the regional championship, edging Mount Ararat of Topsham 139-136, with Cony, Erskine Academy of South China and Morse of Bath all 20 points or less out of first place. The Indians were sparked by individual championships from Brian Parlin (125) and Joe Buzzell (140).

Brewer’s Stephen Desjardins also will seek an individual state champion after winning the Eastern A title at 119 pounds.

eclark@bangordailynews.net

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