Wrestling dual-meet regional set for Tuesday night

The Swarming Hornets won the first contest by a convincing 52-16 score but the ever-cautious Dave Hopkins is not looking past the Patriots, who reached the dual meet playoffs for the first time this decade.

‘‘We’re pretty pumped up and excited about it,” said Hopkins, whose squad is led by Josh Frederick (217 pounds, 25-1 record), Keith Obendorfer (137, 23-2) and Brian Wittenberger (154, 23-3). ‘‘They’re really going to start focusing. It’s not that they haven’t been but we’ve tried to keep them focused on [Saturday’s] matches and not look ahead.

‘‘We’ve already seen them once and the score seemed so lopsided but we’ll try to go back and look our lineup and try to match up. I’d love to get the same results.”

Not happy to just reach the postseason, Wootton coach Chris McTamany and his squad relish the opportunity to face Damascus, which tagged Wootton with its lone loss in the region.

‘‘We want Damascus really bad,” McTamany said. ‘‘For us, we wrestled the worst we’ve wrestled all year. Damascus has a very good team. We’ll be aggressive.”

Jason Lessans (114, 30-4), Alex Schild (121, 28-4) and Andy Rampp (217, 25-1) anchor the Wootton lineup. Rampp and Frederick will square off for the third time this year with each recording a win.

In the other semifinal, Northwest and Springbrook will be squaring off for the first time in a dual meet setting although each did compete in the recent Grapple at the Brook tournament. The Jaguars, with five finalists and two champions, won the tournament with the host Blue Devils finishing second with three champions among five finalists.

This is Springbrook’s first postseason appearance after finishing with a 13-1 record, good enough to secure the No. 2 seed. Nadjitade Badje (173, 25-2) and Carlo Galeano (147, 24-3) are the team’s leaders.

‘‘It’s been a long time coming,” Blue Devils coach Rob Wendel. ‘‘I’m excited for the kids. [Northwest is] very good. Things have to go our way and we need favorable matchups.”

Jaguars coach Joe Vukovich, whose squad also compiled a 13-1 record, hopes his team’s recent postseason experience will offset Springbrook’s powerful lineup.

‘‘They’re a real tough team,” Vukovich said. ‘‘In a dual match, you want to match strength against strength. Hopefully, we can find a way to do that. They’ve gotten better and better and now they’re reaching the top. They’re going to be hungry.

‘‘Hopefully, we can use our advantage of being there before, knowing the stress and the pressure.”

Helping Northwest’s cause are veterans Sean McCarty (127, 24-0) and Jason Edwards (121, 23-1), who won titles at the Grapple at the Brook.

Dual Meet Playoffs

What: 4A-3A West Region Dual Meet Playoffs

Where: Springbrook H.S., Silver Spring

When: Tuesday, Feb. 6, 5:30 p.m. (semifinals); 7:15 p.m. (final)

Semifinal matchups: No. 1 Damascus (14-0) vs. No. 4 Wootton (13-1); No. 2 Springbrook (13-1) vs. No. 3 Northwest (13-1)

State duals: Saturday, Feb. 10 at New Town H.S., Owings Mills