LOGANSPORT — Kokomo 220-pound wrestler Cameron Colby hasn’t lost a match all season, yet he’d never won one like he did Wednesday night in Logansport.

With his squad beating Logansport 30-22 in the final of the Logansport Team Regional, and with just two more matches after his, Colby needed points. He needed to put his opponent on his back and get a full six points instead of just three that come with a standard victory in order to secure a team victory for the Wildkats.

He wasn’t ever able to turn Logan’s Josh Hardy, but the Logan wrestler was called for repeated stalling violations as he tried to avoid being flattened, earning Colby a stalling fall and ending the match early — with the full six points. That gave Kokomo a 14-point lead and secured passage to the state finals on Feb. 25 at Center Grove High School.

When the ref stopped the match, Colby raised his arms in victory and the Wildkats exploded in celebration.

“It was such a good feeling to know that it was down to that point and we’d finally reached our team goal that we’d set all year,” Colby said. “To come off and see the look on their faces: That’s it, we’d booked our ticket.”

Kokomo went on to finish with a 40-28 victory over Logan in the championship round. Earlier, Kokomo beat another North Central Conference foe, Huntington North, 49-21 in the semifinal round.

Kokomo coach Ryan Wells said winning the regional title was “definitely the most excited I’ve been as a coach and probably the most excited I’ve been in my life.

“This is a goal we set four years ago when we got here. We knew we had a special group of freshmen. For these guys to pull through and battle with some of the adversity and injuries they had to get here [to the regional], and for these guys to come out here and get this done is just incredible.”

Kokomo won eight matches in the final round and Logan won six. The Kats were down 16-12 when Kokomo’s Jesse Goodnight scored a pin just 1:14 into the 160-pound match. Next, Keair Ross, who had won a big match for Kokomo in the semifinal round, suffered a pin at 170 pounds, so Logan led 22-18 going into the 182-pound contest.

Fletcher Miller scored a pin at the 2:00 mark just as the first period ended to get Kokomo back on top. Teammate Bo Butler followed at 195 with an emphatic pin in the second period after scrambling to avoid being pinned in the first period. And Colby sealed the deal with his stalling fall at 220 pounds.

“We were back here, talking, planning out what we had to do,” Colby said of the strategic talk during the match. “Jesse, Bo, Fletcher and I, we call ourselves Murderer’s Row and we knew if all four of the murderers got their pins, we’d secure it, so getting that stalling fall is just like a pin.”

Miller and Butler preceded Colby’s pin and set the table.

“Those two were huge,” Colby said. “We’re sitting there still clawing for momentum after we just gave up six [points]. When those two get their pins, like they’ve always done, it’s so much easier for me to go out there on the mat and feed off their energy, and the energy the crowd gets.”

Kokomo also got an 8-2 victory from Andrew Ledford at 113 to open the match, a 7-6 victory from Christian Hall at 126, a second-period pin by Chad Gaddis at 138 and then 106-pounder A.J. Nelson finished the night with a dominant 14-4 victory.

Logan coach Frank Patacsil pointed to two matches as pivotal.

“113 was a big matchup and the Kokomo kid did a good job and controlled the match and ended up winning pretty easily,” Patacsil said. “We thought that was a match we needed to win, and then when it came down to 195, our kid’s not a bad kid, I know Butler’s undefeated. We said ‘hey, go out there and wrestle and good things will happen.’

“We tossed [Butler] on his back, couldn’t secure it and ended up getting pinned in the second period. Those are two key situations that we felt it needed to go our way and it didn’t. Kokomo’s got a solid team and we wish them a lot of luck down at the state tournament.”

The Kats won the semifinal against Huntington with 10 victories.

Nelson (106) and Scotty Barbary (120) accepted forfeits, Ledford (113) won by pin, Hall (126) scored an improbable overtime victory 12-10 after scoring five points in the closing seconds just to force OT. Tony Benedict (132) won 6-1, Goodnight (160) won 10-1, Ross (170) won 7-3 after pulling off a gutsy move to break a late deadlock, and Fletcher (182), Butler (195) and Colby (220) each scored pins.

Kokomo qualified for state in the final year of team state competition. It’s being discontinued by the IHSAA. The Kats will face the Portage Regional winner in the opening round.

“I can not describe how proud of these guys that I am,” Wells said. “This group of kids is really, really special. This is exciting for the school, the team, never made it here before. This is the last time the team state series is going to happen. For us to make it now makes it even that much more special.”