In four years at Eddyville-Blakesburg, head coach Cory Connell has turned the Rockets into a wrestling program that produced an occasional State place finisher into a Class 1A power.

Connell has coached the only two individual State Champions in E-B history and guided the Rockets to eighth-place finishes at the traditional State Tournament the past two seasons.

The fifth-ranked Rockets made more history Wednesday night in Truro, when they advanced to the Class 1A State Dual Tournament on Feb. 27 in Cedar Rapids for the first time in school history.

"When I first got here, this didn't even seem like a possibility. We've come a long way. This is a big win for the program," Connell said. "But I knew we had a great bunch of kids when we got here. I knew we could be successful."

The Rockets blitzed Corning in the first round of Regionals, 58-15, but then had to face State Dual veterans Interstate 35 in the finals in the Roadrunners' home gym. I-35 was looking to make a ninth State Duals appearance after taking care of Martensdale-St. Marys in the semifinals, 47-25.

E-B forfeited to I-35's sixth-ranked 125-pounder Jordan Johnson to start the meet at 130. The Roadrunners bumped Johnson up in hopes of wrestling Nathan VanZante, but E-B moved him up to 135 when they saw Johnson take the mat. At 135, VanZante earned a pin to get those six team points right back.

The coin flip was kind to the Rockets again at 140, when they sent Austin Roe out against third-ranked Dallas Houchins instead of sixth-ranked Brett Roberts. Houchins got his pin over Roe, but Roberts earned an 11-1 major decision at 145 to make it a 12-10 I-35 lead.

"We didn't get the match-ups we wanted, but there was nothing we could do about it," I-35 Coach Randy Calvert said.

Rocket returning State champ Dimitri Boyer put the Rockets back on top with a pin at 152. At 160, E-B's Randy Armstrong earned a hard-fought 4-3 decision over Clay Simmons for a 19-12 Rocket lead.

A pin from eighth-ranked Jake Crosby at 171 gave E-B a solid 25-12 lead. But I-35's Ethan Calvert scored a 13-4 major decision at 189 to cut the lead to 25-16.

A huge win for the Rockets came at 215, where Levi Ratliff scored a takedown in the final 20 seconds for a 2-0 win over Rob Godfrey.

"Levi winning that match was pretty big for us. That was big," Boyer said.

Matt Eads earned a pin at heavyweight for the Roadrunners and the Rockets lost a team point for unsportsmanlike conduct, to close the gap to 27-22.

Jason Crosby pushed the lead up to 11 with a one-minute pin at 103. The Rockets forfeited at 112 and when Joe Bitz pinned Levi VanHemert at 119, the Roadrunners suddenly had the lead, 34-33, with one match remaining.

But the Rockets were in good hands. Seventh-ranked 119-pounder Tanner Scott was bumped up to 125 and he scored a first-period fall over Zach Hutton to give the Rockets the victory and State Duals berth.

"It feels amazing. It actually feels better for the team to go to State than as an individual," three-time State place finishers Boyer said. "It's great to see everyone work hard. It's been one of our goals since we were freshmen, to get to the State Duals and maybe even place."

Connell said this group won't be satisfied to just show up, take a loss and enjoy the rest of the day.

"The expectations are higher than that. We aren't just going there to have fun. We want to do well," Connell said.

Boyer echoed those comments.

"We'll be disappointed if we just go up there and show up. We've met one of our goals and our next one is to place," he said.

The Rockets (21-2) are seeded fourth at State Duals and take on No. 5 Coon Rapids-Bayard (27-2) in what should be a very entertaining first-round bout. The winner more than likely gets top-ranked and five-time defending 1A State Dual champs Don Bosco in the semifinals.

For I-35 (12-5), there was disappointment in falling short of another trip to Cedar Rapids, but Calvert could not fault the effort and applauded the improvement his team showed throughout the season.

"The kids wrestled hard," he said. "Who would have thought we would have even been in this position at the start of the year?"