MORGAN COUNTY
Morgan County hosted the Area 4-AAA duals this past Friday for Senior Night. The Mat Dogs dominated the competition by sweeping the meet with wins over Hephzibah, Harlem, and Cross Creek.
Now, Morgan County moves on to the GHSA Class AAA state championship duals, held at Lumpkin County High School this upcoming weekend. The Mat Dogs will face Pike County on Friday.
The showing on Senior Night impressed head coach Duane Turner, who is in his first year at the helm.
“We’re preparing for the state duals this week,” Turner told the Lake Oconee News. “I’m proud of the way we performed. It was great to get a win over Harlem as well.”
The Mat Dogs had the upper hand in all of its matches Friday, with all of them being convincing wins.
Morgan County routed Hephzibah (60-21) and Cross Creek (62-18) before defeating Harlem (51-27).
However, a surprising result came for Mat Dog senior Caleb Turner, who had his seasonlong win streak snapped by Hephzibah’s Daniel Hargrove. However, the senior bounced back for his team.
According to his head coach, who is his father, that match could’ve “gone either way.”
“Caleb did a great job of bouncing back,” the elder Turner said of his son. “It was a little bit of a gut punch, but he came back strong and put on a great performance after that. The team rallied around him.”
Turner took over for former head coach Jared Rector during the offseason and has been working with his team since. Coming up from the middle school, he already knew how much talent he had.
Turner started working with his seniors – Caleb Turner, Omar Hayes, Chase Scherer, Christopher Morgan, and Miles Butler – when they were in the eighth grade at Morgan County Middle School.
Turner acknowledged this group of five wrestlers has set the tone this year for the younger guys.
“All five of our seniors have been leaders for this program throughout the past four years. Really when they were even freshman,” Turner said. “They’ve been great helping keep the standard high. I’ve been doing this for 18 years, and one of the highlights of my career is seeing them go from eighth graders to now. They were good back then, but to see them develop as wrestlers and young men is great. All five are high-character guys and have helped this program out a lot.”
Those five represented Morgan County well at the area duals, as did juniors Paul Bessette and Evan Johnson. As upperclassmen, Bessette and Johnson add a lot of depth to the Mat Dogs’ arsenal, as well as sophomore Jamari Mundy, who competes as a heavyweight for the team.
Moving forward, Turner hopes those eight wrestlers, along with several others, can lead them this weekend in Lumpkin County. The Mat Dogs are looking to win a state championship this Saturday.
Turner highlighted it will be tough because Class AAA has some great teams, but he believes in his guys.
“I think about 10 of the 16 teams have a shot at the trophy,” Turner said. “It could really come down to one or two matches The good thing is that we have several wrestlers in each weight class.”