Wrestlers open up season with the Braves Brawl
The Braves fielded a pair of teams over the weekend as they hosted their annual duel-format tournament at Star Valley High School. The ‘A’ team went undefeated against the other six teams in attendance. With the six wins, head coach Eddie Clark crossed over the 400-win threshold in his career at SVHS. This is the beginning of his 19th season in Afton. He now has 404 duel wins in Afton and 464 overall in his career.
The ‘A’ team defeated their opponents by the following scores: Jackson Hole (71-6), Rigby (ID) (75-3), Sky View (UT) (63-9), Shelley (ID) (34-32), Cokeville (63-12) & Logan, (56-12).
Look for full results from the tournament in the December 13, 2017 edition of the Star Valley Independent. (Photo provided by Christy VanDeburg)
The Braves will be part of a special evening at Western Wyoming Community College in Rock Springs next Wednesday, December 16 as they face the Tigers on the WWCC mat. Afterwards, the Mustangs will face Grays Harbor Community College out of Aberdeen, Washington with former SVHS state champion, Jake Thompson, as part of their lineup. JV matches begin at 4 p.m. on that evening with the varsity clash scheduled for 5 p.m. The collegiate matches will take place after the Braves and Tigers.
• Basketball teams battle 4A teams in Casper
Although the SVHS basketball teams will not be in the Wyoming 4A classification until next year, they battled a trio of 4A squads over the weekend and were unable to collect a W for the win column.
The Lady Braves led Natrona at the half in the Mustangs first game in their brand new gymnasium but eventually lost 66-56 on Thursday evening. They got 15 points from junior Millie Merritt and 12 from Olivia Muir. The girls fell behind on Friday night by double digits at Kelly Walsh High School before playing the Trojans even the rest of the way as they fell to 0-2 in a 43-34 loss.
Finally, not much went right for the Lady Braves in a neutral court game against the Rock Springs Tigers on Saturday morning as the Sweetwater County squad rolled in a 62-23 rout.
The Lady Braves will be looking for their first win of the season as they host the Sugar-Salem Diggers in the opening round of the 2nd Annual Star Valley Shootout next Thursday at 3:30 p.m. at SVHS.
The Natrona Mustangs exacted a bit of revenge on the Braves for a loss last season as they pulled away from Star Valley, 74-49, in the first game on their new floor on Thursday. The Braves had a back-and-forth affair on Friday night with Kelly Walsh but came up one point short to the Trojans, 43-42.
Finally, the Braves could not keep up with the three-point shooting of the Rock Springs Tigers as they fell to 0-3 in a 74-57 loss on Saturday afternoon.
The Star Valley boys team will open up the Star Valley Shootout on Thursday evening against the Laurel Locomotives out of Montana at 5 p.m. in the main gym at SVHS.
