WATERS: Everything comes in threes

Sometimes things just happen to come in threes.

My three sons, the three Stooges, the Supremes.

A Stuarts Draft freshman, (you guessed it) a 103-pounder named Adam Davis, decided enough was enough and put his coach, the program and the high school on his back and carried them all to the big dance after an eight-year absence.

The always modest, polite and very proud Chip Campbell was a little nervous after he watched his 3-pounder win the semifinal match at the Region III tournament Saturday

“Three trys, I’m happy but a little nervous too,” Campbell said. “I figured eventually we would get there if we kept working hard.”

Oh, and did I mention that Campbell took a trip to the big dance three times during his high school career at Waynesboro, winning a state title along the way? Or that Campbell, who has spent time in the off-season trying to build his program, does it much like the coaches at TA and Fort did when he was in school, by taking kids to camps and tournaments in the spring and summer?

“I hope that the other kids now can see that hard work and off-season training pays off,” he said. “I hope this can be a springboard to getting more athletes out for the program.”

Maybe Elizabeth Barrett Browning, who coined the phrase “three’s a charm” back in 1839, didn’t have freshman 103-pounder Davis in mind then, but he’s a three and he will represent the Draft at the state tournament. He is the first Draft wrestler to do so at the Group AA level since Robert Brooks qualified.

The quiet but confident freshman, who was sporting a Mohawk, began wrestling in Florida.

“I thought I’d have a chance, but I didn’t know,” Davis said “I just wanted to do the best I could. I’ve worked hard in the off-season. I’m happy to be going to states. Where’s it at again?”

Ahh, that youthful innocence.

He will make the trip as a freshman and, whatever the outcome, he has three more years of eligibility.

You get the point?

He is a 3-pounder, so perhaps he will want to talk to two local kids who, as 3-pounders, made their way to the state final match.

One of them was present to watch the Region III show this weekend. Maybe he will want to speak with the kid who wrestled for the top state crown three years in a row, two of them at 103, claiming a championship there before finishing his career as a state champ a weight class higher.

I’m sure Jeff Weeks wouldn’t mind telling him to block out the crowd and just wrestle. Likewise I’m sure the last area 3-pounder to make it to the state finals at the AA level, Gabe Curry, would tell him much of the same.

For some reasons those threes just keep on coming up. So many hi-fives for Fort’s Aaron McMillion who, as a 160-pounder, claimed his first regional crown in, yep sure was, his third trip to the region finals. He will be making his third trip to states in search of his first state medal.

And how about that Lee team, qualifying three of the six who are making their first trips ever to the big dance.

I’m sure Davis, Holt and Wilkerson are as happy as the three chipmunks ever were in joining together in putting their tuxedos on (which in wrestling language is singlets) and joining the crowd of 448 Group A and AA wrestlers at the two-day dance.

You know, it’s been said many times that three’s a crowd. But right here, right now, this sitcom seems more geared to that old television favorite, Three’s Company.

Editor’s Note: Terry Waters formally coached at Fort Defiance and is co-coach of the Mat Pack Wrestling Club.