The “Hood River” plate did not stay at the top of the standings board, but the Hood River Valley wrestling team still had plenty to be happy about after the Mount Hood Conference district tournament.

The Eagles had eight wrestlers qualify for the state tournament this weekend in Portland, including five who won their division.

David Frasier won the 130-pound class, Sean Baker won at 135 pound, Taren Bennett won 145 pounds, Joe Johnson won 189 pounds and Cory Miller won the 275-pound class.

Baker was also named Mount Hood Conference wrestler of the year.

Other state qualifiers included Robert Frasier in second place at 119 pounds, Brandon Gass in second place at 140 pounds and Lucas Mondragon in second place at 189 pounds.

“There are lots of highs for us,” Eagles coach Trent Kroll said. “I’m very proud of them.”

The Eagles finished second as a team to Gresham, who put 15 wrestlers into final or qualifying matches, including three classifications that saw Gresham wrestlers competing against each other.

Gresham coach Zach Enoch was named conference coach of the year.

Baker’s rematch with Barlow’s Cody Grahn, who he lost to in the final dual meet of the season, turned into one of the tournament’s most exciting matches, with both wrestlers heading into the final minute the match tied at one point apiece.

With 40 seconds left in the match, Baker picked up two points for a take down, and then avoided Grahn’s last-second attempt to get him to the mat and picked up the 3-1 win.

“It felt good,” Baker said of beating Grahn. “I felt like all the hard work paid off.”

The two could feasibly meet for a rubber match in the 6A state championship. Baker is the No. 1 seed and Grahn is the No. 2 seed.

Miller also had his match come down to the final seconds.

Miller nearly won the match by forfeit early in the third round, when Centennial’s David Vieru’s arm was injured trying to keep Miller from picking up an escape point.

Vieuru spent nearly all of the five-minute injury time on the sidelines getting treatment for his arm before returning to the mat with under 30 seconds to spare.

That started a minute and a half of intense grappling, where both wrestlers spent much of the time with their arms locked together. Vieru finally separated with under 10 seconds to go, but could not find a way to score a point as Miller hung on for the 3-1 victory.

Bennett’s first place finish provided a nice surprise for the Eagles at 145 pounds. Bennett entered the tournament as a lower seed, but the sophomore beat No. 1-seed Kyle Robinson of Gresham in a 6-5 decision in the semi-finals and then beat No. 2- seed Ryan Lewis of David Douglas in a 6-0 decision in the finals to capture the district championship.

After trailing at the end of round one, David Frasier quickly roared back with several near-falls to defeat Barlow’s Jonathon Osborne at 130 pounds.

It will be the second trip to state for the junior wrestler, who qualified at the 5A level at Sprague last year.

Frasier did not want to waste any time after Osborne took the early advantage.

“I like to get in, get out and get it done,” he said.

As he has many times this season, Johnson made short work of his opponent in the 215-pound championship match.

Johnson defeated Wyatt DeRemer of Gresham in 1:05. Johnson bulldozed DeRemer to the mat 30 seconds in, and then spent the remainder of the time trying to force DeRemer’s shoulders to the mat.

The length of the finals match exceeded that of Johnson’s previous two matches combined. He defeated Centennial’s Sean Bahrman in 11 seconds in the second round, and then pinned David Douglas’ Jordan Guichot 45 seconds in their semi-final match.

Mondragon, Gass and Robert Frasier all suffered letdowns in their championship matches, but will be heading on to state nonetheless.

Overall, 14 Hood River Valley wrestlers placed in the top six in their weight classes.

The state tournament will be held this Thursday through Saturday at the Memorial Colosseum in Portland.

Kroll is glad to be taking eight wrestlers to state, but made it clear he doesn’t expect his team to be content for settling with second place in the conference – not after they made it their pre-season goal to win both the tournament and the conference dual meet titles. Gresham wound up with both.

“We can still improve,” he said. “We are not happy with second place.”