Riding the strength of a deep squad, Buchanan won the 2019 Masters team title, it’s third in a row, with Maximo Renteria (122), Tyler Dean (140), Matt Olguin (162) and Jadon Martin (197) winning individual titles, setting up a run for a Bears fourth straight CIF State Wrestling championship.
Buchanan is ranked No. 1 in the state and No. 3 in the nation by Intermat.
Buchanan scored 307 points with Clovis second at 272 points, Clovis North third with 214.5, Clovis East seventh with 98 and Clovis West eleventh with 77.
Despite only one winner in Jacob Good at 222, Clovis had a great showing with three wrestlers, Matthew Terrance (5th, 108), Justin Mouritsen (3rd, 115), and Brandon Paulson (3rd, 122), defeating wrestlers who had beat them not only once but twice during the year.
“Pretty impressive day, CUSD wrestling is second to none right now,” Clovis coach Adam Tirapelle said. “Add in some of our other good programs around the section and that’s why the level of wrestling is so high.”
Buchanan’s Jack Gioffre (freshman, 106), Carlos Negrete (sophomore, 113), Hunter Leake (junior, 126) and Joseph Martin (freshman, 145) all placed second.
Clovis North sophomore Ryan Franco placed first at 132.
Clovis will send the most wrestlers to the CIF State Wrestling Championships tournament at Rabobank Arena in Bakersfield Feb. 21-23 with 14. Buchanan will send 12, Clovis North 11, Clovis West and Clovis East three.
“When you get down to the Top 12 kids or so, it’s the best post-season tournament in the state,” said Tirapelle, whose brother Troy is the head coach at Buchanan. “I thought our kids wrestled extremely well. We won every medal match for the first time I can remember. And we sent 14 to the state, with no other program in the state doing so, including Buchanan who is ranked third nationally.”
In the girls tournament four Clovis Unified girls placed first: Buchanan freshman Cristelle Rodriguez at 101 over Chelsy Mendoz of Selma 10-4, Clovis’ Valeree Ornelas over Jocelyn Hernandez of Bullard at 111 pounds and BoaAnh Duncan of Clovis won by fall over Xanaysis Real of McLane at 170. Cindy Palayo of Clovis East won at 128 over Izabella Evans of Mission Oak.
Below are the championship results for each weight division:
106 Richard Figueroa (Selma) def. Jack Gioffre (Buchanan)
113 Tristan Lujan (Selma) def. Carlos Negrete (Buchanan)
120 Maximo Renteria (Buchanan) def. Jacob Rivera (Selma)
126 Wayne Joint (Lemoore) def. Hunter Leake (Buchanan)
132 Ryan Franco (Clovis North) def. Giano Petrucelli (Clovis)
138 Tyler Deen (Buchanan) def. Andrew Bloemhof (Bakersfield)
145 Dawson Sihavong (Bullard) def. Joseph Martin (Buchanan)
152 Jace Luchau (Selma) def. Max Anderson (Clovis)
160 Matthew Olguin (Buchanan) def. Max Aguirre (Frontier)
170 Christian Rodriguez (Selma) def. Mark Cardwell (Monache)
182 Trent Tracy (Frontier) def. Tyler Gianakopulos (Clovis)
195 Jadon Martin (Buchanan) def. Bo Jackson (Kingsburg)
220 Jacob Good (Clovis) def. Justin Darter (Bakersfield)
285 Josiah Hill (Bakersfield) def. Jonah Schmidtke (Clovis East)