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Adonis Lattimore, a Landstown High School wrestler born without legs, won the Virginia state championship.
Per Jami Frankenberry of The Virginian-Pilot, Lattimore finished first in the Virginia High School League Class 6, 106-pound weight class at the state wrestling championships at the Virginia Beach Sports Center on Saturday.
Lattimore scored a 5-1 victory over Korlan Tran from Lake Braddock in the final. He earned a 4-3 win against Robinson's Caden Smith in the semifinal.
"I’ve been dreaming of this since I knew what it was, and to finally have it happen is just—I don’t know how to explain it," Lattimore said after his win. "Really if you work hard, you can do anything—even win a state championship without legs."
Landstown wrestling head coach James Sanderlin said Lattimore's win was a goal they set four years ago "and this year it finally came to fruition."
According to Frankenberry, Lattimore went 32-7 this season and won the state title one week after finishing second in the Region A tournament.
A 54-year-old man was arrested Saturday for attacking a 17-year-old high school wrestler during an event in Kannapolis, North Carolina.
According to TMZ Sports, Barry Lee Jones ran down from the stands and knocked over his son's opponent before getting subdued:
Jones was arrested for simple assault and disorderly conduct, and he was later released from jail on $1,000 bond.
While the exact reasoning for Jones interrupting the match at a meet between Southeast Guilford High School and Hickory Ridge High School is unknown, Fox 8 reported that he may have been upset about a move being ruled illegal.
Sharon Contreras, the superintendent of schools for Guilford County, said the following regarding the incident in a statement to Fox 8:
"It's very unfortunate, and it just shows a society that I feel sometimes we're just losing all decorum. I want to say that the parents from that high school wrote us a lovely letter saying they were equally appalled. It's not who they are as a community. And I certainly apologize to the students at both high schools who experienced that, particularly the student who was attacked."
Police said the wrestler who was attacked by Jones did not suffer any injuries during the incident.
New Jersey high school wrestling referee Alan Maloney received a two-season ban after an investigation by the state's Division of Civil Rights into his actions during a December 2018 match involving Buena Regional High School wrestler Andrew Johnson.
Maloney, a white referee, told Johnson, a black student-athlete, he needed to cut his dreadlocks in order to compete during a meet against Oakcrest High School.
New Jersey attorney general Gurbir S. Grewal announced the decision Wednesday and said the state's Interscholastic Athletic Association agreed to institute implicit bias training for all officials and staff, according to ESPN.
"Student-athletes should be able to compete with each other on a level playing field," Grewal said. "Racial discrimination in the enforcement of the rules of any sport is inconsistent with the spirit of fair play."
Johnson ultimately agreed to the haircut and won his match in overtime to help Buena defeat Oakcrest.
After the story made national headlines last December, a source close to Maloney told TMZ Sports the referee was "merely enforcing a rule about hair maintenance—and insists race was not a factor."
In 2016, Mark Trible of the Courier Post reported black referee Preston Hamilton said Maloney "poked his finger in his chest" and called him the N-word during an officials' event, which led Hamilton to tackle him to the ground. Maloney said he didn't remember using a racial epithet.
Maloney, who'd been suspended pending the results of the investigation, will be eligible to return for the 2021-22 wrestling season.
