Mesa grabs state title

Tim Tyers
The Arizona Republic
Feb. 2, 2006 12:00 AM

There can be no sweeter feeling for a coach than to win a state championship at his alma mater.

Mesa High coach Bobby Williams knows that feeling today after his team rocketed from the starting gate en route to a 38-23 win over top-seeded host Mesa Mountain View on Thursday night in the Class 5A Division I team wrestling championship.

It is Mesa's second state championship and its first since 1977. It's also the first state team title decided by dual match competition.

"For years we've been adapting our team to the individual tournament format, and we're actually a better tournament team," Williams said. "But historically, we've also been a good dual team, and I think it fired the guys up because they had to wrestle for each other and not themselves."

Second-seeded Mesa set the tone early against host Mountain View, building a 17-0 lead in the first three matches, recording a pair of falls and a technical fall.

Mesa's Joe Taylor led off Mesa with a technical fall (19-4, win by 15 points) over Nate Lewis at 103 pounds, then defending state champion Anthony Robles, the outstanding wrestler at the last state individual tournament, won by fall over Tony Covert at 112. Joe Loera followed with a victory by fall over Tim Jarman at 119.

Mountain View, which defeated defending state champ Gilbert Highland 42-21 in the semifinals, never led. Mesa captured eight of the 14 matches and recorded four pins overall.

"We lost the first three matches to them before, but it was the way they won," Mountain View coach Shawn Rustad said. "They did pin us, which was different. It's like I said before, it just snowballed. They got the momentum, and we tried to slow it down and not let it happen, but it happened.

"All I can say is coach Williams did an excellent job, and I congratulate him."

Mesa, which defeated No. 6-seeded Desert Vista 38-24 in the semifinals, defeated Mountain View 28-27 in their last meeting of the regular season, after losing to Mountain View 53-18 in their first meeting.

After Mountain View's Preston Pico won a major decision over Joe Ray Berumen at 152 pounds, Mesa's Carlos Lopez took a hard-fought 10-7 decision over Dex Nye to make the score 32-14.

Mountain View was then in position of needing wins by fall in the last four matches, but Gabriel Lopez ended any chance of a Mountain View comeback with a wild 9-8 decision over Conner Stockton at 171 pounds.

"This match could have gone 15 points either way because there were so many key matches that were close the last time we wrestled," Williams said.

"Gabriel's win was huge because it wasn't a matter of pins anymore, just finishing the match. The last couple matches were just for fun for the guys."