The Steele Canyon High School girls wrestling team had a great start to last Saturday’s Division I San Diego Section championship tournament on campus. However, the Lady Cougars were overtaken in the later rounds by defending champion Olympian High School to place runner-up in this year’s 27-team field.
The Lady Eagles finished with194 points while the Lady Cougars finished with 174 points. In tournament competition, that’s close.
Steele Canyon finished the event with two weight class champions: Bella Seviallano at 103 pounds and Faith Manis at 191 pounds.
Granite Hills, which placed seventh in the Division I team standings with 83 points, notched one division champion: Kyli Stanley at 133 pounds.
“Twenty-seven teams, 139 wrestlers, a lot of great wrestling,” summed up Division I tournament director Trevor Keifer, who also coaches the Lady Cougars. “Overall, it was a good day of wrestling. The three Grossmont League teams that were there (Steele Canyon, Granite Hills and Grossmont in the Division I tournament) put wrestlers on the podium.
“The team race was close all day. Steele had the lead throughout the day, but Olympian climbed their way back to repeat as D1 team champions.
“I am so proud of how the Steele girls wrestled throughout the day. We came up short in a couple of semi-final matches that could have changed the outcome of the team race. Bella Sevillano’s title was a great way to end her senior year, along with Faith Manis’ back-to-back titles.”
The top four place-finishers in each weight class qualified for the upcoming San Diego Masters state-qualifying tournament Feb. 18 at Mission Hills High School. The tournament will take place alongside the boys state-qualifying tournament in an historic first.
The Lady Cougars will send eight wrestlers to the girls Masters. Besides Sevillano and Manis, Aubrey Gaona finished third at 154 pounds, Elizabeth LeNoir finished in fourth place at 133 pounds, Aiesha Sall finished fourth at 145 pounds, Marina Gonzalez finished fourth at 162 pounds, Kennedi Jones finished fourth at 172 pounds and Laura Estrada finished third at 237 pounds.
The top four place-finishers received medals at both the Division I and Division II finals.
Overall, 16 East County mat women qualified for this year’s state-qualifying tournament, including 10 from the Division I field and eight more from the Division II field. Brawley won the Division II team title hosted by Holtville High School in Imperial County.
Other East County Masters qualifiers from the Division I tournament included the Granite Hills tandem of Peyton Wells (third place, 162 pounds) and Isis Jahnig (fourth place, 128 pounds).
The top four place-finishers from the Division II championship tournament also advanced to compete in this year’s Masters tournament.
Santana’s Amber Spencer won the Division II individual championship at 145 pounds while West Hills’ Mariana Morales emerged victorious in her 162-pound division.
East County Masters qualifiers from the Division II tournament included West Hills’ Kay Lim (second place, 128 pounds), Monte Vista’s Olivia Davis (second place, 139 pounds), Mt. Miguel’s Emma Contreras (second place, 152 pounds), Mountain Empire’s Melina Delgado (third place, 108 pounds), Mt. Miguel’s Serenaety Terry (third place, 237 pounds) and Monte Vista’s Sierrah Tolefoa (fourth place, 172 pounds).
The top four place-finishers at Masters qualify for the state championship tournament Feb. 23-25 in Bakersfield.
“We placed 10 of our 14 wrestlers with eight guaranteed Masters qualifiers and one alternate,” Keifer said. “I’m looking forward to seeing how they perform at Masters. Hopefully, we can punch a few tickets to the state meet.”
In the mix
Other place-finishers for the Lady Cougars included Valeria Anaya (fifth place, 108 pounds) and Brook Meiers (sixth place, 128 pounds).
Granite Hills’ place-winners at the Division I tournament also included Rose Ann Carolino (fifth place, 145 pounds) and Aliana Gonzalez (sixth place, 139 pounds). Grossmont’s Melony Hernandez-Galeana placed sixth at 172 pounds.
Grossmont finished 22nd in the Division I team standings with 10 points.
El Cajon Valley’s Honey Orduno placed fifth at 237 pounds at the Division II tournament while El Capitan’s Anna Armenta placed sixth at 123 pounds and Mountain Empire’s Ayana Beltran placed sixth at 103 pounds.
Brawley won the team title with 270.5 points ahead of runnerup Holtville with 138.5 points. West Hills was the highest East County team in the finals with 48 points in 15th place while Mt. Miguel was 17th with 44 points and Monte Vista was 19th with 40 points. Mountain Empire finished in 20th place with 37 points while Santana finished 24th with 34 points, El Cajon Valley was 28th with 15 points and El Capitan was 29th with 13 points in the 34-team field.
Ladies first
Sevillano pinned Olympian’s Isabella Ramriez in 1:23 in the championship round while Manis pinned San Marcos’ Dianna Duarte in 1:40. Stanley captured a 4-2 decision over Rancho Bernardo’s Alyssa Jones in the finals.
Spencer pinned Imperial’s Anjolie Fernandez in 5:36 in the championship round while Morales pinned Valley Center’s Krista Ghosh in 1:39 to wrap up her individual gold medal.
Lim lost by a 3:13 pin to Mar Vista’s Tavia Ostheimer, the lower weight MVP at the preceding Metro Conference championship tournament, while Davis dropped a 7-4 finals decision to Brawley’s Savannah Gomez. Contreras lost by a 5:52 pin to Mt. Carmel’s Melanie Hayslip in the finals
In third-place matches at the Division I tournament, Gaona pinned Del Norte’s Lakshanya Sankaran in 37 seconds while Wells pinned Steele Canyon’s Gonzalez in 1:34. Estrada pinned Mission Hills’ Irma Arevalo in 1:44.
In third-place matches at the Division II tournament, Delgado pinned Castle Park’s Ma Vega in 3:55 while Terry pinned Southwest El Centro’s Makayla De-Long in 50 seconds. Tolefoa lost by a 1:30 pin to Point Loma’s Ellie Eastley.
