SAN MARCOSSAN MARCOS — Carlsbad junior Mason Walsh nearly saw the defense of his crown go down in the first moments of his 182-pound final at Saturday’s San Diego Section Masters Wrestling Championships at Mission Hills High.
Barely 10 seconds into his match against Ryder Dearborn of West Hills, Walsh found himself airborne and straight to his back, victim of a Dearborn head-and-arm.
The top-seeded Walsh scrambled and fought back.
“I got a bit sloppy and he threw me,” said Walsh, usually known more for his running from scrimmage after scoring 18 TDs and ing for 1,544 total yards offense for the Lancers, an Open finalist. “I knew it was early and I had plenty of time to come back.”
He did, but it got close. Late in the third period, the No. 8-ranked 184-pounder in the state knotted the score at 6-6. Looking like overtime, Walsh (37-4) scored the winning takedown with nine seconds left in the match and pinned Dearborn with three ticks left with a power half.
While that was the most exciting match of the final; the team title again was claimed by Poway.
The Titans sent 10 wrestlers into the finals, winning seven. All 14 earned spots in next week’s state tournament in Bakersfield as the other four all finished third.
Poway finished with 377.5 team points, ahead of runner-up Granite Hills with 252.
It seems sometimes for Poway the internal battles between each other are as big as the ones on the mat.
Two of their defending champions weren’t just battling each other for most wins, it seemed they were trying to see who could wrestle less.
Entering into their finals, 145-pounder Laird Root (39-4) had pinned his opponents in 12 seconds, 1:00 and 3:13. His teammmate Luke Condon (36-1), at 170, dispatched his first three foes in 51 seconds, 32 seconds and 1:09.
Root overcame his initial deficit to Condon, pinning Rancho Bernardo’s Marcus Caro in 57 seconds, while Eastlake’s David Mitrovich made Condon work a bit longer before being victim of a 26-11 tech fall.
“We really like to one-up each other,” said Root.
Other Titans claiming titles were Edwin Sierra at 113, Elias Navida at 126, Paul Kelly at 138, Angelo Posada at 160 and Adam Farha at 285.
Granite Hills had a good showing, putting five in the finals and nine advancing to state.
Abram Cline at 103 got the finals off to a good start for the Eagles against the Titans, ing a 9-3 decision over Devin Bobzien.
“It feels so awesome to finally win this,” said Cline, a junior transfer from Olympian this year after he feel to Poway’s Sierra in last year’s Masters final. “My ultimate goal, of course, is to win state.”
Cline (27-3) is currently the No. 1-ranked 103-pounder in California.
“Nobody really cares about the ranking during the year,” said Cline. “But I’ve doing all the right things and working hard.”
ing Cline on top of the podium for the Eagles was 152-pound champion Colin Guffey (45-2). His pin of Tyler Brown of Mission Hills in 4:44 sends him back to Bakersfield after finishing fifth at 132 last year.
Rancho Bernardo’s Air Force Academy bound Jacob Jones (36-3), ranked No. 5 at 126, and No. 10 ranked Brandon Eusebio (41-5) also were victorious for the Broncos.
Brawley’s Robert Platt, ranked No. 6 in the state, improved to 34-3 after receiving a medical forfeit in the final.
Patrick Henry’s Eljay Vinoray improved to 33-4 with a first period pin at 220.
Farmer is a freelance writer.
