Bulloch Academy, Screven County and Statesboro all participated in a quad meet at BA Wednesday night — but BA came out on top in a big way.
    BA swept away the competition, beating Montgomery County, Statesboro and Screven county all by margins of more than 40 or more points. Head coach Andy Tomlin knew his team would do well, but it’s the atmosphere we was most pleased about.
    “There was a real buzz in the air tonight,” Tomlin said. “It was an exciting place to be as it should have been. It’s always great when we get that kind of turnout for a meet with some local teams there.”
    While Screven County didn’t make well in the actual duels due to a number of forfeits in certain weight classes, they got a great night from their 106-pounder Kevin Burns. Burns won both of his matches against BA and Statesboro plus a forfeit victory against Montgomery.
    However the real showcase came when Statesboro and Bulloch Academy faced off, both coming off wins earlier in the quad. The match started off favorably for the Blue Devils when Gabe Hardy and Kasey Baynon picked up wins at 106 and 113.
    Down 10-0, Riley Joyce picked up BA’s first points of the night with a first period pin over Aaron Baynon. However Statesboro’s Xavier Schoot fired back with a 9-3 win over Jake Wasdin to put Statesboro up 12-6 in the duel.
    “I thought Riley wrestled really well tonight,” Tomlin said. “If we can keep getting more matches like that from him we can have some real assurance in our lower weight classes.”
    Despite being taken down for the first time all season by JC Robertson, Kyle Samuels worked out and pinned Robertson in the first period to tie the match at 12-12. Ethan Reeves followed for Statesboro with first period pin to put Statesboro up 18-12, but those were the last points Statesboro would get for the match.
    BA would score pins in five of their next seven matches, with only Myracle Salinas and Chris Simmons avoiding the pinfall for Statesboro. However according to Statesboro head coach Bo Viness, that’s all he’s looking for in his young team during his first year as head coach.
    “I’m preaching to our guys six minutes of wrestling,” Viness said. “We just need to stretch out these matches to get better as wrestlers and right now we’re doing that.”
    Statesboro (15-8) will head out to their area duels at New Hampstead this weekend to see where they stack up in their area, while Bulloch Academy (19-0) head out to Benedictine on Tuesday to take on the Cadets and Windsor Forest at 5:00 p.m.