Feb. 3, 2004: The Standard Examiner

THS Wrestlers Place at Tourney
by Nick Drake

Tooele High’s wrestling team didn’t exactly wrestle well in their final home meet of the 2004-05 wrestling campaign.

In fact, the Buffs lost a match they should have won against region rival Ogden Thursday at THS. The Tigers edged past their hosts 39-35 in the final region dual.

However, the local grappling squad battled back just one day later to turn in a better overall team performance Friday and Saturday at the North Sanpete High Invitational wrestling tournament in Mt. Pleasant.

Tooele had a trio of varsity wrestlers garner medals for placing in their respective weight classifications. A.T. Cisco, Ray Trujillo and Jacob Foster all placed for the Buffs in the two-day event.

In the junior varsity portion of the tournament, Tooele had seven wrestlers place in the tough two-day affair. Eric Mascarenas and Josh Brown seized top honors in their respective weight classifications. Teammates Josh Austin, Dakota Steiner, Dustin Sheehan, Dustin Teets and Cody Judd also earned valuable medals for the Buffs.

Tooele now looks to the Region 11 Wrestling tournament slated Thursday and Friday at Ogden High. Weigh-ins are from 1-2 p.m. each day and wrestling begins at 3 p.m. both days. The top four wrestlers in each weight class earn a state berth into the Class 3A State Wrestling tournament slated Feb. 10-12 at Utah Valley State College in Orem.

Tooele Coach Codie Miller said his team wrestled well in the two-day tournament at Mt. Pleasant.

“We should have beaten Ogden in the dual,” Miller noted. “We just didn’t wrestle like we were capable of. In the North Sanpete wrestling tournament, we wrestled well. But now we just need to focus on the Region 11 wrestling tournament and get as many wrestlers qualified for state as we can.”

In the North Sanpete tournament, Cisco battled to a bronze finish at 140 in the varsity tournament to pave the way for the Buffs. Foster garnered a fourth place finish in the 152-pound division for Tooele and Trujillo captured a fifth place at 145 for the local squad.

In junior varsity tourney action, Mascarenas posted a perfect and undefeated two-day tournament to win the 119-pound weight class. Brown also registered a perfect two-day tourney effort at 215 to garner the gold medal in the event.

Meanwhile, teammate Austin seized a silver at 112 for the Buffs and Steiner fought to a runner-up finish in the 130-pound weight class. Sheehan captured a silver at 189 for the Buffs and Teets captured a bronze at 135. Teammate Judd claimed a bronze at 171.

Results on the dual as well as region seeding will be published in Thursday’s edition.