2009-2010 Season Summary

It’s beginning to sound like a cliché, but the 2009-2010 wrestling season really was quite special.  It began with a record-breaking number of guys coming out.  While we’ve had 60 or so guys sign up on paper before, this year we actually had 65 guys show up to the room.  We carried well over 50 for most of the season.  Once again, we were the underdogs to the Summerville Bears and the local papers continually reminded their readers that this was their year.  They had a large crop of seniors who had been together since the early days of elementary school wrestling and the Tuolumne county-wide youth tourneys and frankly, they were quite good.

            We got underway in our usual fashion, wrestling the first week of December with the varsity at the Sheldon Duals and the J.V.’s at the Amador Novice Tournament.  Two notable starters, however, were not in our lineups.  Senior returning state qualifier Tyler Brown had suffered a severe shoulder injury (torn labrum) during the latter part of the football season.  His return was questionable.  He was going through physical therapy and not wrestling at all.  He worked hard running to get his conditioning up, but he could not step on the mat until he was cleared by his physical therapist.  Similarly, senior standout Brenden Sullivan tore his ACL during the football season, and his season was also in question. 

As usual, the football players came off a very successful and extended season, so they barely had any conditioning as their competitive season began.  The varsity finished 4^th at Sheldon, going 2-2, and the J.V.’s took their fair share of medals at Amador.  Two standouts at the J.V. tourney were first year junior Monti Wilson, and freshman Justin Brown, younger brother of senior returning state qualifier Tyler Brown. 

Our first scheduled dual of the season against Sonora was cancelled due to a severe weather system that closed both schools during the week and made it difficult to hold practices.  We did wrestle Tokay the following week and beat them soundly at both levels.  The varsity won 39-19, and the J.V.’s 48-25. 

The following weekend we finished 11^th at the Western Invitational, with Gary Gellerman finishing 3^rd, Kyle Towler 6^th and Kash Wilson 8^th.   While we did not place anyone at the Sierra Nevada Tournament in Reno, the guys got valuable mat experience and learned how to deal with big venues, and long tournaments.

As we began the new year, the team started to come together.  Seems like the Christmas practices and a little break from competition helped them focus, and a spark was there that the coaches hadn’t seen earlier in the season.  That spark was later to become a big, big fire.

We didn’t have our two injured starters back, but guys were beginning to find their weight classes and settle in.  The league season started out with a dual against Linden, which due to a lack of numbers on their part, was not much of a contest.  The varsity won 63-13 and the J.V.’s 69-6.  Next came the Gordon Hay.  This tourney gave both the team and the coaches a glimpse of what we were capable of.  We finished 1st of 13 teams and had 7 medalists, but perhaps more impressive was the way in which we did it.  The team standings were up for grabs until the finals.  However, in spectacular fashion, all five of the Calaveras wrestlers in the finals won, and both guys wrestling for 3^rd and 4^th won as well.  By the time the dust settled, the team standings were not even close.  The coaches cannot recall a tournament where all finalists, both championship and consolation, won all their matches.  Additionally, Tyler Brown made his debut return and was one of the 5 champs.

The following week we wrestled Amador in Sutter Creek.  While they are experiencing a numbers crisis, they have several seasoned and talented wrestlers on their varsity squad.  The varsity and J.V. teams won their matches 46-23 and 66-7, respectively as Brenden Sullivan finally returned to competition, recording a pin for his debut match.  Two days later, the varsity travelled to Lincoln High School in Stockton to wrestle in the Dave Mendoza Memorial Invitational.  (Dave Mendoza was the wrestling coach at Lincoln for many years and coaches Bowe and Bicocca have many fond memories of coaching against him.  He died several years ago while vacationing in Mexico.)  Again, some foreshadowing occurred in that the team dominated the tournament, placing 15 wrestlers.  (We were allowed to bring some extras, and they placed as well!)  Champions on the day included Justin Brown, Kash Wilson, Tyler Brown and Gary Gellerman. Coming in second were Brenden Sullivan and Monti Wilson.  (A footnote to Monti Wilson’s 2^nd place finish:  He was beating a powerful Amador wrestler by 8 points near the end of the third round.  As he put his opponent on his back again, Monti dipped his own shoulders to the mat and pinned himself!  (Only one other C.H.S. wrestler has ever pinned himself in varsity competition—that was Scotty Kirk (’90) at the Ponderosa duals.  Ironically, Scotty was at the Mendoza Tourney to witness Monti do the same thing.  Coincidence?)  3rd place finishers included Christian Lohsen, Shawn Kuntz, Derek Jaurigue and Jack Carlile.  Charlie Hoskin finished 4^th, Brendan Raymundo and Zach Malandra 5^th, and Brady Dubois and Aaron Garrett placed 6^th. 

The Argonaut dual took place in Jackson just 4 days later where the varsity won a commanding 53-9 match, and the J.V.’s won 66-15.  On the weekend, at the ever-tough Foothill Tournament, the team placed 19^th of 97, and had two placers.  Tyler Brown finished tied for 3^rd, and Gary Gellerman finished 4^th. 

The following week featured a “double-up” week with a Tuesday dual against Sierra Ridge (ROP) and the Thursday dual against Summerville that would determine the league title.  Although we left a number of starters at home for the Sierra Ridge match, the varsity won 58-15 and the J.V.’s 60-12.  The long awaited Summerville match came to the Mike Flock Gym on Thursday, January 28^th.  A large crowd turned out to see what was expected to be a real nail-biter.  Both teams had been calculating line-ups for weeks and critical match-ups could very well be the key to winning a league banner.  The J.V. match was a thriller, with the lead changing several times.  C.H.S. finished the night with a 40-31 victory, thanks to a last-match pin to seal the title.  The fans were expecting an equally exciting match at the varsity level, but such was really not the case.  After an expected early lead by Summerville, the match was never really in question.  The Redskins came away with a 42-23 win and their 3^rd consecutive M.L.L. dual meet title.  The final dual meet of the season, the annual cross-county match against Bret Harte resulted in easy victories for both the J.V. and the varsity.  The J.V.’s won a remarkable 78-0 decision and the varsity won 56-12.

On February 6^th, the team participated in the Section Dual Meet Tourney, just as we have every year since its inception (Not many schools can make that claim.)   We beat Lindhurst 73-4, and while the match was never in question, there was a key match between two state qualifiers.  Tyler Brown got to test the water (and his shoulder) by wrestling a returning state qualifier at 152’s.  Brown won the contest 5-3.  The 2^nd round matched us up against Livingston, the 2^nd Place league finisher from the Western Athletic Conference.  The Reds made short order of the Wolves by beating them 57-14.  In the finals, we met Central Catholic, who beat us 39-22 to take the crown.  We finished up as the Dual Meet Section Runner-ups (or as the guys would like to say, #1 public school champs...)

The league tournament was hosted by Argonaut High School.  The team won the tourney handily, but again, in incredible fashion.  By the time the finals rolled around, all 14 wrestlers were still competing.  We placed 8 in the finals, 5 in for 3^rd and 4^th, and one who would have to wrestle for an alternate spot.  When it was over, 7 of the 8 had won titles, 4 of the 5 had taken 3^rd, and the one wrestling for the alternate spot had also won.  In the finals, we had wrestlers in the 1^st four weight classes and were considered underdogs in three of the four.  In the 103 pound match, freshman Steven Walker wrestled Bret Harte wrestler Aaron Ritchie who had beaten him 15-0 just 9 days earlier.  In an absolutely incredible match, Walker won in overtime to become a freshman league champ.  In similar fashion, 112lber Christian Lohsen had been beaten soundly by defending league champion Carson Homuth in the B.H. dual 9 days earlier.  Lohsen beat him 6-2 to become the 2^nd freshman league champ on the night.   At 119 pounds, freshman Justin Brown became the 3^rd freshman on the night to win a league title, having complete control of his Amador opponent and winning a 5-1 victory.  In a long anticipated matchup, senior Brenden Sullivan would see his arch rival, sophomore Brady Day from Summerville.  Day, who was the defending league champ and ranked in the section, had beaten Sullivan in their last two meetings.  Sullivan, wrestling on a torn ACL, was at an obvious disadvantage going into the match.  Day pretty much controlled  most of the match, scoring a 1^st round takedown and 2^nd round reversal to take a 4-2 lead into the 3^rd round.  With less than 20 seconds left in the match, Sullivan scored an escape, and hit a miracle-like head throw with under 10 seconds left to pick up 5 points and an 8-4 come-from-behind victory.  Needless to say, the gym was in absolute pandemonium.  At 145 pounds, Tyler Brown won his 3^rd league title by beating eventual state qualifier Carson Gracia of Summerville.  The two had met in the dual meet two weeks earlier where Brown wrestled a conservative match and won 3-2.  In the league finals, however, he let it all out, winning by a lopsided score of 16-2.  First year wrestler Monti Wilson continued to impress people by winning a league title on his 1^st attempt.  What made it more satisfying was that he beat the Amador wrestler who he had been beating when pinned himself earlier in the season.  The final champion of the night was Gary Gellerman, who won his second title with an easy victory over an Argonaut opponent, beating him 16-0.

With the league action over, it was crunch time.  That time of year when the season gets long, the nerves get frayed and guys get tired.  At least that’s what seems to happen to most teams.  For us, we tend to step it up around this time of year.  We went to the Division 5 Section Tournament (small school section/subsection) at Hilmar High School with 14 wrestlers looking to get as many to the Master’s (Big Section) as we could.  Central Catholic was the favorite, but Escalon and C.H.S. would be in there trying to mix it up.  As it turned out, we were in 1^st place over Central Catholic by 11.5 points going into the finals with Escalon a distant 3^rd.  Central had a solid finish, winning all but 1 of the 9 matches they had in the medal rounds, and we won 3 of 9.  As a result, we finished 2^nd of 28 teams, placing 9, and qualifying 8 for the Masters Tournament.

The Masters Tournament is something to see if you haven’t been there in awhile.  It has certainly evolved from the old days of having it in a Tokay, Folsom or Pitman high school gym.  It is now a big venue, a rather formal affair, not that much different than the state tournament.  It is currently being held at the Stockton Arena, and consists of a 32-man bracket with the top 7 finishers earning a berth at the state meet.  (A far cry from when Bicocca and Bowe started and only 3 qualified!)  We brought 8 wrestlers to the tournament hoping to get some guys through to the state meet in Bakersfield.  As it worked out, we finished 10^th of the 170-some wrestling schools in our section and qualified three to the state.  Tyler Brown made it to the finals and finished second to the eventual state champ, Tyler Johnson, from Vacaville.  (Interestingly enough, Brian Rutledge beat Johnson 2-0 at the state meet two years ago to get in for a medal.)  Tyler was quite disappointed in his performance against Johnson, but it was tempered a bit when Johnson won the state title one week later.  In an incredible chain of events, 1^st year wrestler Monti Wilson qualified for the state tournament to the amazement of just about everyone in the arena except Monti.  He beat two highly ranked 160 pounders (quite handily, by the way) and finished 5^th.  Gary Gellerman qualified in a rather unique way.  Earlier in the week we found out that he had a pretty tough spot on the bracket.  He would face a highly ranked wrestler from Grace Davis in his 2^nd match, a guy he had never beaten before, and if he could manage to win that match, he would wrestle a kid from Vacaville who was ranked 1^st in the section and 5^th in the state.  Most of us were trying to figure out how to get him through the tournament down in the consolation bracket.  As it turns out, Gary had an awesome day.  He beat the Grace Davis kid, and went on to beat the Vacaville wrestler to guarantee at least a 6^th place finish and a trip to Bakersfield.  He lost in the semifinals to the eventual section champion in triple overtime and finished 6^th.  Another incredible but bittersweet story was freshman phenom Justin Brown.  He finished 8^th and just missed qualifying for the state tournament by losing two consecutive overtime matches.  He became the 1^st freshman to place at the Masters and now has the school record for the best record for a freshman at 34-11.

C.H.S. has taken 3 wrestlers to the state tournament in one season only once before, back in 2004.   This year the 3 qualifiers only managed to muster up two wins and nobody placed, but it was quite a thrill to go to that tournament with a group.  The season certainly ended on a high note, leaving the returners and coaches with a good feeling that will lead us to work hard in the off season and look forward to the challenges of next season.