By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

OREGON CITY, Ore.– All the blood, sweat and tears are about to come to pay off for the Clackamas Community College Wrestling Team this weekend.

The Cougars, standing at 16-2 overall and winning their third NWCA National Dual Champions this season, will go into Highline College Saturday looking to do what they do best.

Work hard and play hard behind the swagger and confidence they’ve built throughout the season to this point entering wrestling’s postseason.

“We’ve built a lot of confidence over the regular season and finishing 16-2, great accomplishment,” said Clackamas Head Coach Josh Rhoden.“The interesting thing about wrestling is dual meets don’t mean a whole lot other than the Dual Meet Championships.

“Now it’s up to each individual go out there and do their job at their weight classes.  We have one of the toughest regions in the country.  The job is to go out there and not overlook anybody and score as many points as we can in the weight class.

Going light to heal up for the final push and to accomplish the goal to win their third-straight West Regional Championships and to qualify for Nationals.

Practice was sharp and precise with that goal in mind to do everything in their abilities to give themselves the best opportunity to win come the end of the match and the end of the tournament.

“It’s more or less the same for us,” said Haszell “Bam” West. “We’ve been doing really well this year, so it’s more or less the same thing, just keep on doing what we’ve been doing and keep winning matches.  Getting better.

For 285-pound wrestler Brandon Johnson, this West Regional Tournament will be his last in a Cougar uniform.

“It’s important for me for being here a couple of years to succeed,” said Johnson.  “To go up there and wrestle to the best of my ability.  On top of that, it’ll be awesome to win it as a team, both at Regionals and at Nationals.

“All that hard work that everyone put in, starting guys, redshirt guys, everybody around us that put all that time and energy into it.  It all comes down to the icing at the top of the cake with the National title which has been the goal all season.”

West knows that the sophomores like Johnson and John Morin wants to go out on top, to leave their impression on the Clackamas program.

With the younger talent like him, Michael Knoblach and the rest of the underclassmen want to make sure they do that for them.

“These are our third-year guys, this is their last hoorah with Clackamas for sure,” said West about Johnson and Morin. “It’s kind of puts it into perspective for me a little bit.

“I want to go out there and get a win, get bonus points for those guys and do anything in my ability to get the championship for them.  Give those guys those memories before they leave.”

For the Cougs, even though it would be awesome to get their third-straight West Regional Championship and get their second NJCAA Championship under Rhoden, the focus is one match at a time.

“The mantra for us is to focus on the task at hand,” said Rhoden.  “I don’t think that changes now because it’s the postseason, it’s just more wrestling matches.  We’ve been really good at wrestling matches.

“If we treat it like it’s another time for us to get on the mat and do what we do really well, then that’s all we’re going to do.  Go out and handle our business.”

Clackamas will continue to sharpen up their skills and heal up through Wednesday and will travel to Highline College Friday for this weekend’s showdown with the other schools in the region for the Championship Saturday.