By BAKER ELLIS / Sports Editor

ALABASTER – The Thompson wrestling team is hosting a dodge ball tournament at Thompson High School on Friday, Sept. 25 to raise money for the upcoming national tournaments the team is traveling to in Minnesota and Wisconsin in January of 2016.

The Thompson wrestling team has won five straight state wrestling titles, and is now making a push to make its presence known on the national stage. Both tournaments the team will travel to in January of 2016 are invite-only tournaments, and some of the best prep wrestling in the nation takes place there.

“This is kind of unchartered waters for us,” head wrestling coach Shawn Weltzin said. “We’re trying to get that national ranking. We’ve never been to this tournament in Wisconsin before, but we’ve gone to the one in Minnesota twice.”

It was Weltzin’s idea to have the dodge ball tournament as a fundraiser. “We wanted to try something new and fun and have some competition,” he said. “We can have some of the coaches participating from different sports and have all different types of people competing in it. We’re going to try and make it a fun atmosphere. We put it on a bye week for the football team because that was the only time it would work.”

The tournament costs $30 per team, and Weltzin said he would like to have as many as 40 teams participate to help raise the $12,000 it will take to transport the team to and from both tournaments.

There will be a trophy for the first place finisher as well as a trophy for the best team uniform. The tournament is double elimination, and for information on signing up contact coach Weltzin at sweltzin@gmail.com.