For the fourth straight season, Gulf Shores has advanced to the final four of the duals wrestling state tournament. The Dolphins will battle the Tallassee Tigers on Friday morning in Birmingham with a trip to the state championship on the line.

Last year was a similar semifinal matchup where Gulf Shores lost to Tallassee but then won the consolation championship thanks to pins in the final two matches from Hayden Cook and Noah Guthrie. This year, the Dolphins used a 73-5 win over the Beauregard Hornets at home last Saturday in the first round of the state tournament to punch their ticket to Birmingham for the final four.

Also on Friday will be the final matches of the girls’ state championship tournament that gets started Wednesday at Thompson High School. After the sport was sanctioned for championship play over the summer, this will be the first girls’ wrestling state championship officially hosted by the Alabama High School Athletic Association.

Daphne looking for revenge

After they lost their chance at a three-peat of team titles last year, the Daphne girls’ team will enter the final tournament of this season with revenge on their minds. Alanah Girard and Kalyse Hill walked away as individual state champions and Kalee Holder earned a runner-up finish but it was only good enough for a state runner-up finish for the Trojans.

This year, Daphne went undefeated as a team and won the Southeastern Pools tournament at Thompson last Saturday to close the regular season. McKenzie Nugyen and Emily Smith joined Girard and Hill in winning their weight classes to help the Trojans finish with a 54-point advantage over second place Thompson.

Gulf Shores and Daphne will be joined by a host of other Baldwin County teams at the state tournament in Birmingham so stay tuned to @GCMSportsAL for all the updates from the boys’ dual finals as well as the girls’ individual championships.

Duals vs. individual wrestling

While plenty of wrestlers will hit the mats at the Birmingham Crossplex this weekend, not every match will fall under the same umbrella. As the boys’ duals tournament wraps up, the girls’ individual tournament will also conclude with different scoring systems.

Duals wrestling involves two teams’ whole lineup of all 14 weight classes from 106 pounds to 285 pounds against each other. Each match goes toward an overall score where whichever team wins more weight classes will win the overall matchup.

Individual wrestling takes each team’s top wrestler in each weight class and puts them all in a bracket per division. Each finishing position in the bracket has a point value and whichever team scores the most points with the highest finishers will earn the win.