Turlock High varsity wrestling is one league victory away from completing the perfect regular season in duals after toppling Buhach Colony on the road Wednesday in their penultimate Central California Conference contest, 57-12.
“We are feeling good right now, we still haven’t been at full strength all season, but against El Capitan, that was the closest we been to being fully healthy,” said Turlock head coach Mike Contreras.
Just a day prior, the Bulldogs hosted EC and managed to dominate them in a 44-19 final.
“EC won four matches against us, but we feel good and are in the position we want to be, that is our goal to win the league title every year,” said Contreras.
Turlock is now 5-0 in their final season competing in the CCC.
They will close out their league duals against Pitman at the Pride gym on Wednesday.
“Pitman lost, El Capitan has a loss, so we are the only undefeated team,” said Contreras. “Now it’s just wrestle this week at Mid-Cals and then be ready for the Pitman dual next Wednesday. If Pitman beats us, then it will be a three-way tie with EC, Pitman and us. Then there is a criteria that it will come down to.”
The same situation occurred last year, but for second place.
“It happened last year when there was a three-way tie for second place after Pitman won it all,” said Contreras. “We lost out on criteria, so hopefully that doesn’t happen this year, hopefully we can just finish. We control our destiny, obviously. If we win we move on to the playoffs and EC is in the playoffs since Pitman would have two losses. Two teams get to move on as a team.”
Before doing that, the ‘Dogs had to settle a score with the Thunder and did it convincingly.
Seven wins came via forfeit for Turlock, which included victories from Adrian Heras (126), Diego Cornejo (152), Alejandro Lopez (160), Lance Couchman (170), Mauricio Garcia (182), Javier Mendoza (220) and Mike Jeffus (HWY).
Will Giron (113) won a 9-3 decision that went three rounds after he was down 2-0 early in the first.
At 120-pounds, Gio Villegas escaped with a 4-2 overtime win after sneaking two late points with 11.7 on the clock. Joe Silva (138) won his match 6-3 after a grinding three rounds.
The most lopsided match of the night came at the 195-pound weight class when last year’s state qualifier Breck Jeffus pinned his opponent Alejandro Gonzalez (Buhach) in the second round with 1:20 left after dominating from start to finish.
“Everyone’s confidence is super high, everybody seems to be mentally prepared. Physically we are pretty good. Everybody is banged up at this point, but we are ready,” said Contreras. “We are in a good position now. We just have to keep doing what is right. We have three practices left before that dual meet, so hopefully nobody gets injured.”
Turlock will next compete at Mid-Cals at Gilroy High at 9 a.m. Saturday.
“Obviously and we have a good shot this year since we are in Division-II like Pitman was last year,” Contreras said. “So, we are looking at that Section title as a goal, we will see how it goes, just one thing at a time, I don’t want to look too far ahead. The thing is practice, make weight, have a good tourney this weekend and then see what we do against Pitman.”
