Mustang matmen ranked first in section, eighth in state
GILROY – Central Coast Section Champions is an honor the Gilroy High wrestling team will carry with them all season long, but being the best last year does not guarantee the same result this year.
That’s why the Mustang matmen – including four individual section champions and five state qualifiers – have been working even harder to maintain their top status.
Once again, the garlic grapplers are the preseason favorites to win CCS, and, even before their first match, they also are ranked eighth in the state of California after finishing 19th last season.
“Hopefully, we’ll live up to that ranking again,” fifth-year head coach Armando Gonzalez said. “We’re being recognized by the state rankers and people like that as one of the top programs not only in our section but in the state. … We’ve got five returning state qualifiers, so that gives us a good ranking.”
Seniors Mark Zabala (a CCS Champ who placed sixth in the state), John Gurich (a CCS Champ who took fourth in state) and Chad Haygood (who finished third in CCS and wrestled in the state meet) as well as sophomores Armando Gonzalez (a section champ and state qualifier) and Adin Duenas (a CCS runner-up and state qualifier) highlight the powerful and extremely deep Mustang line-up.
“It’s not so much (that people are gunning for us). It’s just coming together and doing as much as we can do,” Zabala said. “We know people are going to go out there and try to headhunt us, but it’s just part of it. We’re not really focusing on that. We’re just focusing on what we can do.”
There is not much the Mustangs are not expected to do this season, and Coach Gonzalez, in his seventh year with the Gilroy High program and 12th with the Gilroy Hawks Club team, is getting his squad ready to forge even further ahead.
“The expectation level and the pressure that we’re getting to repeat and continue to be successful is probably the hardest thing to deal with after a successful season,” Gonzalez said. “It just seems like everybody’s interested, everybody’s keeping an eye on us, everybody’s interested in what we’re doing in Gilroy here.”
And why not, since the Mustangs have nine wrestlers ranked in the section and other underclassmen who will make their way up the rankings as the season progresses.
“We’re very comparable to last year’s team,” Gonzalez said. “We’re expecting to have a three-pounder qualify for state, a 12-pounder, 19s, 25s, probably 30s or 35s, 52s, 60s, 71s – we should have eight state qualifiers this year. We could have our 215-pounder, also.”
Seniors Callan Romesberg (a T-CAL Champ who went 3-2 in CCS), Miguel Maldonado (who finished second in league and went 4-2 in CCS) and Jose Albarran (a league champion) are all back hoping to make their final seasons their best of all.
“I’ve got the senior leadership, and then I’ve got Mando and Adin, who are sophomores but are really, really seasoned. With Eric Lara, I have seven seniors on this team, but the rest is young,” Gonzalez said. “They’re all freshmen and sophomores. I don’t have any juniors.”
The new crop of garlic grapplers includes 103-pound freshmen Nico Naranjo (a three-time junior high county champ and two-time winner at the Tournament of Champions who finished with an undefeated 78-0 record at South Valley) and Rudy Maldonado (a two-time state runner-up who finished second in the county last season).
“We’ve got a lot of guys new coming in, but they are only new to the high school,” Zabala said. “They’ve been around for a while. We’ve all been together with the Hawks.”
Coach Gonzalez knows them all too well: “Those freshmen coming in, they’ve been wrestling with me for a while so they’re very good and they will be in the line-up.”
The freshmen crop also brings junior high county champions Austin Gabrud and Ismael Gutierrez to the varsity unit.
“The kids are hungry,” Gonzalez said. “With the kids who are out for the team now, they’re a good group and they’re very dedicated. Right now, our quality of practices are great. We’re having a great time with the kids who are out here.”
The Mustangs will not have to look far for their stiffest competition as former section champ Hollister is in the same league and scheduled for a Jan. 14 dual meet at Gilroy High.
“Hollister is going to be tough this year. Hollister will be our chief rivals. They’ll be tough. They’re returning 12 of their 14 guys,” said Gonzalez, whose squad defeated Hollister 54-7 last year. “Our team this year is more of a tournament team. We’re not as solid of a dual meet team as we were last year, but we’re still every bit as good of a tournament team as we were last year. The dual meet with Hollister could be a lot closer than last year.”
Gilroy, which has one of the toughest tournament schedules ever, will start with the Coast Classic at Scotts Valley High Dec. 12 and 13. Then the Mustangs head to Reno, Nev., for the Reno Tournament of Champions that is ranked the fifth-toughest tournament in the nation.
“We’re really going to test our boys out there. This is a very tough tournament,” said Gonzalez, whose Mustangs won the Sierra Nevada Classic last season. “If we can break into the top 10 in this tournament, we’re going to be one of the top ranked schools in the nation.”
After the Cupertino Tournament Jan. 10, Gilroy welcomes archrival Hollister at 7 p.m. Jan. 14 (a must-see, do-not-miss dual meet) and then travel to Fountain Valley High for the Five Counties, a tournament ranked even tougher than the one in Reno.
“The fact that we won CCS last year presented a lot more distractions and a lot more interests and just a lot more challenges. But that’s what all the great programs and the great coaches have to deal with,” Gonzalez said. “When you can dominate for 10 years, that’s a true sign of what a great coach can do. Every year that you are successful, it gets a little bit harder. … More and more people want to see you fall on your face.”
The Mustang matmen don’t plan on that happening.
