By Tracy McCue, Sumner Newscow — In a year that will see a record-breaking eight Wellington girls get to the Class 4A State Wrestling Tournament, the Crusaders could not qualify one boy at the Rose Hill Regional held Saturday.

Cayson Ramirez

Wellington head coach Mitch McComb attributed it to an extremely stacked regional featuring the best teams in the state and some unique circumstances where Wellington’s best wrestlers were in the most loaded divisions.

“In 2024, we took 11 wrestlers to regional and got four state qualifiers, this year we didn’t get any,” McComb said. “In 2024 we had a cumulative 11-18 record in that tournament. This year we were 13-18. We actually got more wins last weekend, and yet no one is going to state. Go figure.”

Wellington got four wrestlers into the consolation semifinals or what many describe as the “blood round” — that match that determines who goes to state, and who doesn’t. It’s arguably the most intense round in all of high school sports.

The Crusaders went 0-4. Even more disheartening, three of the four wrestlers had a lead at some point during their matches – and two of them had a big lead going into the third period.

The biggest heartbreaker was 190-pounder Cayson Ramirez, arguably Wellington’s best wrestler. He went into the Regional tournament with a 21-6 record but happened to wrestle against 10 wrestlers with a winning record and a returning state qualifier who just wrestled for the first time this year after breaking his leg in football.

To top of the injustice, Ramirez was leading 7-1 going into the final period against Cameron Hagerman of Mulvane in the consolation semifinals. He then got pinned in the waning seconds of the match.

“From top to bottom, this was the toughest weight division in the region,” McComb said. “Thirteen of the 16 wrestlers were seniors, 12 of them had winning records.”

Wellington’s demise came almost simultaneously. Goran Djuraovic at 215 and Boston Berndt of 285 were also wrestling on different mats at the same time as Ramerez.

Djuravic was also leading 7-0 going into the second period and lost the lead to Devin Carroll of Augusta eventually losing 9-8 to finish the season.

Bernd, on the other mat, lost by by pin :20 into his match.

Earlier in the consolation semifinal round, Colton Elmore, at 157, saw his state tournament dreams end when Peyton Tabor of Winfield pinned him at 2:01.

In the end, Wellington finished with 39.5 points in regional for 13th place out of 16 schools. Rose Hill, which could very well be the eventual state champion, finished with 258. Winfield had an impressive 152.5 for second, and Andale scored 142.5 points.

Wellington had five other wrestlers competing. Cabel Bogguss at 132, Rogan Wetta at 138 and Axl Norris at 150 finished one match short of the consolation semis losing by pin.

Aiden Rains at 120 and Evan Kelley at 175 were both eliminated in the second round.

The full Wellington regional results can be found here. The team scores can be found here.