FOUNTAIN VALLEY – The McDonnell brothers seemed to be in a hurry Saturday.
Khale and TJ McDonnell won all of their matches for Fountain Valley’s boys wrestling team by fall Saturday to win their weight-class championships at the CIF Southern Section Inland Division Individual Championships at Fountain Valley High.
Fountain Valley won the team championship, its third CIF-SS team wrestling title over the past five years.
Khale McDonnell, a sophomore, won the 170-pound championship. Senior TJ McDonnell repeated as a CIF-SS champion at 182 pounds.
Khale McDonnell pinned Serrano senior Blake Chaffee at 3:52 in the first-place match.
Khale had split his two previous bouts with Chaffee, including a 7-2 win at the Five Counties meet at Fountain Valley last month. He expected to do better against Chaffee this time.
“With all the coaching and the training I’ve been doing,” Khale said, “I knew I could do a lot better than the 7-2 (score), open up the gap and beat him by a lot more.”
TJ McDonnell, ranked third in the state at his weight class by TheCaliforniaWrestler.com, pinned his first opponent at 1 minute and 27 seconds into the match and followed with pins at 1:47, 0:21 and 1:20 before pinning Laguna Hills senior Jeremy Kanter at 1:14.
TJ McDonnell was inspired to get the quick pins so that he could win the Upper Weights outstanding wrestler award, which he did, but also for self-preservation reasons.
“The less time on the mat, the less chance of getting injured,” he said. “The state tournament’s coming up, so I’m just really trying to get ready for that big show.”
The Barons scored 282 team points. Hesperia was second at 221 points and Oak Hills was third at 210.5. Corona del Mar finished fourth with 174 points, Newport Harbor was sixth at 137 and Laguna Hills was seventh at 111.
Fountain Valley finished second to Northview in the CIF-SS Central Division finals last season. The Barons have won seven CIF-SS boys wrestling team…
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