Eunice Academy wins fourth straight state title

For the fourth straight year the Eunice Black Belt Academy is the Sport Karate International Leagues Louisiana State Karate Champions.
Maj. Eddie Thibodeaux with the St. Landry Parish Sheriff’s Department and master instructor-owner of the Eunice Black Belt Academy says the team set out to defend its 2012, 2013 and 2014 Sport Karate International Leagues Louisiana State Karate Championships in Lafayette.
The state championships had Louisiana’s top karate schools throughout the state competing for the title of School of the Year and individual state karate titles.
The Eunice karate team not only won the Top School in Louisiana for the fourth straight year but in individual competitions won 66 first-place awards; 31 second-place awards; 11 third-place awards; three fourth-place awards; and two fifth-place awards, Thibodeaux reported.
The divisions once again had many of the team in the same division’s competing against each other, this allowed the team to sweep some events, Thibodeaux said. The division’s are separated by age and rank for fairness.
The school also defended its breaking title; members for the 4th straight year won the Black Belt, Adult Under belt and Junior Under belt Breaking Championships.
Two-time champion Dwayne Richard defeated team member Gloria Martel to regain the state title.
Last year Richard was defeated by a fellow team member when he broke his hand during a break.
The team members were, Dwayne Richard, Dustin Williamson, Gloria Martel, Christian Bergeron, Logan Bergeron, Drake Pousson, Micah Granger, and Hannah Richard.
Throughout the year the points earned at a Louisiana karate tournament are kept to award overall Top Competitors for Louisiana.
The school took home four of the four overall top competitor awards.
Hannah Richard of Richard took home her third Top Junior Black Belt, Dustin Williamson of Eunice took home his first Top Junior Under belt, Dwayne Richard took home his fourth straight Top Adult Under belt Competitor of the Year and Drake Pousson won the Top Adult Black Belt in the State.
After the two day competition is complete, the night finals have all the first place individual state titles winners complete against each other in the Grand Champion overall events.
It is considered much like the MVP but have all the individual state title holders that were separated by age to compete against each other to crown a true overall winner.
The Eunice team had members in almost all the overall Grand Champions divisions. Eunice members who won Grand Championships in the state games were, Reagan Hill, 10, Hannah Richard, 15, Micah Granger, 15, Matthew Odom, 16, Dwayne Richard, 37, and Logan Bergeron, 6.
Master Instructor Eddie Thibodeaux was also named Black Belt Instructor of the Year for Louisiana. Last year the school was honored to be named tournament of the year and Thibodeaux won the promoter of the year.
In the competitions, the team competes in creative forms, breaking, traditional and creative weapons, fighting, and traditional forms. The creative division allows competitors to create their own forms with or without music and weapons. The traditional forms division must use an “original style” form from Japan or Korea. The fighting division is two minutes long with the competitor with the most points at the end of the time winning. All competitors are divided by ages and ranks.
The karate school is located in Eunice and has team members from across the Acadiana area including Richard, Church Point, Kinder, Basile, Iota, Mamou and Bayou Chicot.
The team varies from 15 to 30 members at an event due to out of state travelling and scheduling conflicts and competes coast to coast against the top schools and students in the nation.
This year was the first year that the state finals were held in Lafayette, the commissioner of the state announced that next year the Louisiana State Karate Championships will return to Lafayette.
The team is competing at the National Black Belt Leagues World Sport Karate Championships in Hilton Head South Carolina this week.
The team is ranked seventh in the Top 25 Sport Karate Schools in the world beating out all other Louisiana schools along with schools in the USA, Mexico, Canada and as far as Ireland.
Thibodeaux is director of Training and Professional Development at the St. Landry Parish Sheriff’s Training Center.