Chiefs take fourth place at Tri State Tournament

COEUR D'ALENE, ID. - Moses Lake wrestling traveled to North Idaho College with the hope of putting the memory of its 22nd place finish last year at the Tri State Tournmanet behind them.

The team exceeded Jaime Garza's expectations placing fourth overall with a score of 135 points, narrowly trailing Lake Stevens.

"Am I satisfied? No," he said. "But it's definitely an improvement from where we were at last year so I'm pleased with that."

The Chiefs are scheduled to dual Lake Stevens, the defending state champion, this Friday so Garza was glad his team and his coaching staff was able to see the Vikings up close this weekend.

"It's great, it gave us some... a gauge to where we're at," he said. "I would be concerned if we were 30 or 40 points out from them, but we're right there... two to three matches if we would've won we would have been ahead of them."

Moses Lake's lightweights had a strong showing at the tournament with sophomores Jesus Cornejo (98 lbs.) and Cooper McCullough (106 lbs.) placing third and second, respectively.

Senior Fernando Leyva (113 lbs.) was also able to take second place in his weight class.

However, the struggles for junior Trey Long (113 lbs.) continued in Idaho. After losing his match at the East Valley (Spokane) dual last Thursday, Long failed to place at the Tri State Tournament losing in the quarterfinals to Lakeside's Dalton Young by major decision and falling in the consolation round four to A.J. Crew of Lake Stevens by decision.

"There's just some work that needs to be done," Garza said. "He's a gamer and we just need to get back and get after it. Between now and the state tournament is a lot of time to make up ground."

Junior Chase Clasen (132 lbs.) had a strong tournament taking fourth place. Clasen's improvement has shown since over the course of the last eight days he has defeated two state champions and two state runner ups.

"He's just shown a lot of grit and fight out there," Garza said. "His confidence is increasing, it's rising and he's wrestling well right now."

Quincy took four wrestlers to the tournament. Isias Jimenez (145 lbs.) placed sixth and Antonio Melendez (170 lbs.) placed fifth,