The Greeneville wrestling team’s record-breaking season rolled on on Wednesday night as the Greene Devils dismantled Seymour 63-12 in the Class A State Sectionals and advanced to the Class A Duals State Tournament for the first time since 2022.
The victory marked the program’s 40th duals win of the season, further extending the school record the Devils set just days earlier at the John Klock Duals. With a tenacious home crowd packed into the gymnasium, Greeneville delivered a dominant performance for their fans. The Devils now sit at 40-5 on the season.
“The crowd was unbelievable, it was so fun,” Head Coach Randy Shelton said after the match. “The atmosphere here tonight, this gym was rocking, the crowd was loud. They celebrate with us. I mean, they’re part of Greeneville wrestling.”
Coach Shelton said that after days spent scrutinizing lineup decisions like where to plug in guys like Gabe Oakley and Brylan Rhodes, that ultimately he came to the conclusion, keep it simple.
“At one point we just got to the point where we’re like, you know what? We’re good enough,” Shelton explained. “We’re gonna line up with our regular lineup and we’re just gonna make them meet us. We didn’t do any bumping, we didn’t do anything fancy. We just went out there from top to bottom, wrestled well, and we only lost two matches. We dared them to beat us with our best.”
That confidence proved well-founded. Greeneville won 12 of 14 matches, collecting three forfeits and six pins along the way. The Devils dropped matches only at 106 pounds, where Seymour’s Germain Velasquez pinned Connor Ducatte, and at 144 pounds, where Cayden Zeits defeated Cameron Sneed by fall.
Everything else was Greeneville.
The scoring onslaught began at 113 pounds with Carson Hurst’s pin of Wayan Hill in 1:52, erasing Seymour’s early 6-0 lead from the opening match at 106. Forfeits to Oakley at 120 lbs. and Rhodes at 126 as Seymour tried some gamesmanship with their lineups gave Greeneville some breathing room.
Seymour’s decision to bump Kirby Haggard ultimately backfired though, as Greg Tester took over late in a back-and-forth match, locking up a cradle and winning by pin with just 30 seconds remaining in the match.
While the Devils rolled through most weight classes, Coach Shelton pointed to one bout as the match that swung the tide early.
“Biggest match of the night was Sonny Pryor,” Shelton said emphatically. “Sonny gets a quality kid and he just went back to the stuff that he knows how to do. He didn’t do anything fancy, he didn’t try to make up moves. He just went out there and wrestled a solid match against a quality opponent.”
Pryor’s 11-6 decision over Andrew Wolf at 138 pounds gave Greeneville a 27-6 lead with seven matches remaining.
“I felt like at that point, their bench was gone,” Shelton said. “They knew what was getting ready to happen and we just went out there and performed.”
After Pryor’s pivotal win at 138, the Devils’ upper weights took over. Hunter Shelton won by decision at 150, followed by Mack Hall’s pin at 157.
With Seymour desperately needing a spark, Gideon Ellenburg took the mat against junior standout Duke Delozier. Ellenburg rose to the occasion, throwing Delozier to his back with a lateral drop just seconds into the match. Though Delozier fought out of the pin attempt, Ellenburg controlled the bout and secured a 17-12 decision.
The last four matches of the night took just 2:29 of total mat time, as James Treptow delivered a fall in 1:25, Hayden Moore picked up a forfeit win at 190 lbs., Hayden Matthews pinned his opponent in just 19 seconds at 215 lbs., and Douglas Blake closed out the night with a 45-second pin at 285 lbs..
Shelton was quick to credit Greeneville’s success to the quality of competition within Region 1, particularly longtime rival Elizabethton.
“One of the reasons we’re here tonight and we dominate Region 2 is because we had to wrestle a tough team like Elizabethton twice this year,” Shelton said. “They pushed us to be better and it showed tonight when we wrestled teams from other regions. A lot of this goes to the quality teams that Eddie Morrell and Elizabethton put on the mat.”
That preparation against top-tier regional competition proved invaluable when Greeneville faced opponents from outside the region.
With the sectional victory secured, the Greene Devils now turn their attention to the state duals, where they’ll look to capture the program’s second state championship in that format. The team’s 40-5 record speaks to a season of historic proportions, but Shelton and his wrestlers know the hardest tests still lie ahead.
For now, though, the Greene Devils and their faithful crowd can savor a moment years in the making, a return to the state duals and a season that continues to rewrite the record books.
The Class A Duals State Tournament will be held January 31 at the Williamson County Ag Expo Center in Franklin.
