High school wrestling: Viewmont dominates en route to crown

OREM — With their second consecutive team title and five of the last six already in hand, the only question left unanswered coming into Friday's finals of the 5A state wrestling tournament was how many individual championships the Viewmont Vikings would win.

Last season, the Vikings won the team title despite having only one individual champ and only one wrestler in the finals. This year, they advanced five into the finals, and they had two champs as Mike Winger (125) and Danner Kjar (145) claimed titles.

"It was nice to have a few more kids in the finals, but it would have been nice to win a couple more of those," said Vikings coach Brandon Ripplinger. "Still, it is a great accomplishment by these kids to win a title. It is not an easy thing to win a state title, and we will savor this one for a week or so — then it's back to work."

Viewmont scored 192 points and placed 11 wrestlers in the top six. Davis finished second with 145.5 points. Pleasant Grove (133.5), Fremont (130.5), Weber (123.5) and Layton (121.5) rounded out the top six.

Winning a second individual title and capping his second consecutive undefeated season was Alta's 112-pound champion, Carson Kuhn.

"It feels great," Kuhn said. "It was a little different coming in with everyone gunning for you, but I just tried to wrestle my match and now I've got two."

Junior Kade Moss of Bingham won title No. 3 at 130 pounds.

"I have had a goal ever since I was little to become a four-time champion, and this was one more step on the way," Moss said. "It still is a great feeling to come out on top. I don't think that feeling will ever get old."

Having a flare for the dramatic became a calling card for Viewmont's Winger during the tournament. It took him triple overtime to win in the semifinals, and he didn't wrap up the 125-pound title until he scored on an escape with only .09 of a second remaining, giving him a 1-0 win.

"I just never let myself doubt that I could get it done," Winger said. "I was able to dig down and regroup and just go for it right there at the end."

The intensity ratcheted up considerably during the 140-pound final between Viewmont's Ikeru Abe and Davis' Braiden Hart. The two schools are intense rivals in any sport, and these two grapplers had already staged three closely contested matches earlier in the year. With the crowd reaching its loudest point all night, chanting their wrestler's names, Hart prevailed with a narrow 3-2 decision.