KISSIMMEE - With Clay High chasing Fleming Island in the past district and region championships with the usually dominant Golden Eagles not able to run away from the Blue Devil challenge in both meets, there was a sense of irony in Clay putting two athletes in the Class 2A finals and Fleming Island just one.

"Our motto was 'close the gap' on Fleming Island and I think we made some strides in the program to do that," said Clay coach Jim Reape. "They are still one of the strongest programs not just in Clay County, but statewide and they make everyone in the county better."
Tampa Jesuit topped the Class 2A field and defending champion Lake Gibson with 201 points to Lake Gibson's 146.5 with Fleming Island fifth with 71.5, Middleburg eighth with 56.5, Clay 14th with 41 and Oakleaf 23rd with 22. Ridgeview had one wrestler, Ray Goforth.
For Fleming Island coach P.J. Cobbert, who has been a top-five finisher in both Classes; 3A and 2A, his matches were mostly decided by one or two points.
"We will have to start a tougher summer to win those close matches," said Cobbert. "We had a couple of unfortunate matches especially at 285 with our guy, Kevin Reyes, slipping, falling and then having his guy jump on him. He'll be back."
Reape lamented that his four guys just weren't enough to take on Fleming Island's depth.
"We wanted to take six or seven to compete, but only got four to go," said Reape. "You have to have numbers to finish in the top five."
For Clay, sophomore Jacob Bucci, who missed most of the first half of the season rehabbing a knee injury, stormed through his Clay Rotary, district and region matches to recapture a top seed in 113 and a strong probability of at least the final, fell 6-3 to Tampa Jesuit's Malachi Ortiz. Ortiz scored four points with two takedowns in the third period to secure the win after Bucci got the lead 3-2 with a reversal in the second and an escape in the early part of the third period.
"He's a tough kid, but the Jesuit guy did some things that we had not seen on film and maybe caught us off guard," said Reape. "That being said, Jacob's return to this level after missing most of the first half of the season is a testament to his focus on the prize."
Bucci was decisive in his preliminary matches with a first-period pin, a 7-3 win and a 10-0 major decision to the final with Ortiz taking out Fleming Island's Matthew Newman 2-1 with a first-period takedown that he carried to the final stanza in his side of the bracket to prevent a Clay County final.
At 126, Herrera, who was looking for a rematch final with Oakleaf's Sebastian Bonachea as both were set in opposite semifinals for the possibility, but Bonachea lost to eventual champion Camren French of Mariner via a 7-0 loss. Herrera, who Reape said had a good bracket to go deep in his weight class, stayed the course and won an 11-4 match over Coby Shields of Gulf Breeze before French (54-1) shut him out 9-0 in the final. French turned a third place at the 2023 Knockout Christmas Classic at Osceola High into six significant wins in 2024 with titles at John Joyce Memorial, Colby Singletary Invite, LCAC Boys Wrestling Tourney, districts and regions.
"He made the most of a good draw and just wrestled solid," said Reape.
Herrera, just 8-2 coming to state with a sixth at the Clay Rotary and no place at Knockout; 40-9 in his career, was a new face for Blue Devil coach Jim Reape on the state scene.
Clay also had Landon Martin at 157 (1-2) and Aaron Stacey at 215 (0-2).
The third Class 2A finalist, Fleming Island's Kaden Schaefer at 150, was focused on his region title to match up with two-time defending state champion Draven McCall, 27-2, with Schaefer unbeaten to the final at 44-0.
Both Schaefer and McCall had dominant paths to the final with Schaefer teaching his first match, 18-1, then hitting two first-period pins. McCall, a two-time defending state champion and a fourth-place Fargo All-American, pinned his first two, then won a tough 4-3 match in his semifinal over Brandon's Thomas Gernhart who was unbeaten and twice a state medalist; fourth as a freshman.
Fleming Island put seven wrestlers on the floor at the state meet with Matthew Newman getting seventh at 113, Jordan Mukaddam finishing fourth at 120, Dylan Beck at 157 (0-2), Christopher Chop finishing fourth at 175 and Kevin Reyes at 285 (1-2).