Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – When friends on the football team convinced Anu Dokun to go out for wrestling his senior season he figured he could have some fun and fill a hole in the West High lineup.

Dokun was able to do both of those things during his first season of varsity wrestling but on Saturday he did a whole lot more.

Dokun won the 195-pound title at the Class 3A, District 6 meet at West High earning a trip to the 3A state meet next week in Des Moines.

“I was kind of hesitant to go out because I hadn’t wrestled for the past two years and I thought ‘I might as well it’s my senior year so I just decided to do it’,” Dokun said. “I never thought I’d make it this far. I was decent my freshman and eighth grade year but this is Iowa and coming from Memphis there is no way I thought I would get this far.”

The title from Dokun capped a strong day for West High as the Trojans went 6-1 in championship matches, qualified seven wrestlers for the state meet and claimed the district team title with 208.5 points, two more than runner-up City High.

“That was the goal this week leading up that was our breakdown was 1-2-3 district champs,” West High senior Will Hoeft said. “That was a goal for us and I think overall we performed really well.”

All five of West High’s top-five ranked wrestlers won district titles on Saturday along with Dokun while 120-pound sophomore Parker McBride (13-6) advanced with a runner-up finish.

Fourth-ranked Grant O’Dell (25-6) won at 106 and top-ranked Hunter Garvin (29-3) pinned his way to the 132-pound title.

No. 5 145-pounder Graham Gambrall (32-5), fourth-ranked 170-pounder Ashton Barker (26-5) and second-ranked Hoeft (19-1) at 182 pounds all returned to the state meet with district titles.

That was the expected for West High. The unexpected came from Dokun.

“When you have leaders like Hunter, like Hoeft like Ashton Barker it’s easy for guys to look at them because you have an example in the room and they just kind of follow and they slowly come along,” West High coach Nate Moore said. “You see guys like Anu and they just keep getting better and better and better and better.”

Dokun lost six of his first nine matches to open the season and was 5-12 at the holiday break.

The more Dokun wrestled the better he got.

By the middle of January, the progress started to show.

“About half way through things started clicking,” Dokun said. “I started working on my double leg and that kind of stuff and it started working pretty well and I stuck with that and I’m here.”

Dokun entered the district meet 13-17 on the season and reached the final with a third-period pin of Cedar Rapids Jefferson junior Preston Bruck.

He trailed Cedar Rapids Kennedy’s Ethan Sullivan in the third quarter of the 195-pound championship but used a reversal and a three-point nearfall to earn an 11-6 decision.

“It felt amazing honestly,” Dokun said. “How far I’ve come since the beginning of the year when I was pretty much losing every match to now winning the district it feels great.”

The title match on Saturday showed just how far Dokun has come this season.

Dokun lost a 6-3 decision to Sullivan in a dual on January 9 but won his final two meetings with the Kennedy senior 8-6 at the Mississippi Valley Conference earlier this month and 11-6 on Saturday.

“He came out and he was very green, he’s still really green but he’s gotten better every single match and he’s going to the state tournament,” Moore said. “It’s just a good example for other kids in this school to give wrestling a shot you can be successful even if you haven’t done it your whole life.”

Class 3A, District 6 Meet

At West High

Team scores – 1. West High 208.5; 2. City High 206.5; 3. Cedar Rapids Kennedy 200; 4. Marion 139; 5. Cedar Rapids Jefferson 124; 6. Clear Creek Amana 94; 7. Cedar Rapids Washington 89; 8. Liberty High 47.5

Individual champions; state qualifiers

106 – 1. Grant O’Dell (ICW) major dec. Niyo Gady (MAR) 11-2

113 – 1. Ethan Wood-Finley (ICH) pinned Jonah Hallam (CRK) :54

120 – 1. Garrett Bormann (ICH) dec. Parker McBride (ICW) 4-1

126 – 1. Sam Stevens (CCA) pinned Reese Hayden (ICH) 1:25

132 – 1. Hunter Garvin (ICW) pinned Kael Scranton (CCA) 2:53

138 – 1. Ashtin Falck (CRK) dec. Austin Fritz (MAR) 11-4

145 – 1. Graham Gambrall (ICW) dec. Dylan Falck (CRK) 9-3

152 – 1. Reece Caven (ICH) pinned Divion Ocheltree (CRK) 2:19

160 – 1. Ben Kueter (ICH) tech. fall Collin Flannagan (CRK) 24-7; 2. Ben Gibson (MAR)

170 – 1. Ashton Barker (ICW) major dec. Alex Koch (CRK) 12-2

182 – 1. Will Hoeft (ICW) tech. fall Jay Oostendorp (CRK) 18-3

195 – 1. Anu Dokun (ICW) dec. Ethan Sullivan (CRK) 11-6

220 – 1. Gavin Bascom (CRK) dec. Jason Lemus (ICH) 8-7

285 – 1. Dawson Sweet (CRJ) dec. Tate Sykora-Matthess (CRW) 3-2

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