The Potosi High School wrestling team participated in the annual SEMO conference tournament, the girls on January 21 at Jackson, and boys January 22 at Cape Central. Three of the Potosi Trojan wrestlers medaled: senior, Luis Ortiz, junior, Levi Courtney, and freshman, Allison Missey. 

Allison Missey took second place at 102 pounds. She is now the first Lady Trojan all-conference wrestler ever. Missey said she has come further this year than she thought she would. She said “ I didn’t expect to do so well my first year. I thought I would do okay but not as good as what I’m doing now.”

Missey explained how she prepared for the conference tournament. “I went to practice and worked extremely hard on the things I knew I needed help with. Sometimes when I felt I needed extra practice I would practice with my brother at home and do some private lessons. Honestly, the thing with wrestling is that it’s a big mental game.” 

 Missey said, “I was super excited to place at conference, and I know that I worked as hard as I could to get to where I am right now and that just makes me even happier.”

 Missey has been thinking ahead and has confidence that she will win state in the future match. “If I keep up my hard work and keep doing what I’m doing I think I could possibly win state,” Missey stated. She said that “it’s going to be practice after practice and I’m going to have to keep myself in the right mindset getting ready for state. ” 

Courtney took first place at 170 pounds. He did not see his season going like it has so far. “I had no idea that our season would go like this; it’s a big change from last year,” stated Courtney. It took hard work for Courtney to get where he is now. “I knew it was going to be difficult so I fixed little mistakes in my moves and worked on cardio for the long matches I knew were coming.” 

Wrestling season does not end at conferences. They have districts, sectionals and state left. Courtney said he is currently focused on preparing first for districts, and then sectionals.” I’m not focused on state as of right now, since we have sectionals this year. Knowing I have to make it out of two more tournaments is making me more focused.” Since districts come first, he is focusing on districts and taking it one tournament at a time. Courtney said that right now he is focused on districts. “For districts I will be learning new moves and perfecting my moves I know to increase my chances of winning each match.” 

Courtney said, “Conference was a lot different from last year. This year the rules are different like being on the floor before you match to get warm. It kind of makes getting focused difficult. Courtney has already worked hard to get where he is now.

Luis Ortiz took first place and 285 pounds. This is not Ortiz’s first conference win. His junior year he took second place. When I asked Ortiz how he felt about his season this year he said, “I think it may go how I want it, I just want to stay humble.” 

Oriiz said, “I usually work on the lil stuff like technique and some moves that I feel like would be good to hit in a match.” 

Ortiz explained how conference was different this year. “It was only small schools instead of everyone.”  Ortiz said, “I hope I can make it back to state just by working hard and wrestling my matches.”