White River the favorite on the 2A mats at Mat Classic XXX

TACOMA — If the Toppenish Wildcats are to three-peat as 2A state wrestling champions they are going to have to have some help taking the sting out of the White River Hornets.

Toppenish sends four regional champions and ten qualifiers to Mat Classic XXX — the same numbers as last year’s successful combination. However, those numbers may not be enough to overcome White River’s seven regional champs and twelve qualifiers.

According to Washington Wrestling Report the top four 2A teams in order are White River, Toppenish, Orting and Wapato.

“White River is the team to beat,” Othello coach Rudy Ochoa II said. “They had a young team last year that had success and they pretty much did not graduate anybody.”

Haiden Drury (120), Kyler Romero (126), AlexEi Rubio (132) and Andres Aguilera all won regional titles while Uriel Garcia (106), Isaac John (132), Keyano Zamarripa (160) and Salvador Osorio (195) all placed second for Toppenish. The Wildcats outscored East Valley of Spokane 195.5 to 136 to earn the Region IV team title. Wapato was third (120.5) and Othello placed fourth (117.5).

White River counters with regional champions Gabe Hawthorne (132), Weston Lyver (145), Nate Moore (152), Max Wheeler (160), Jack Ervein (170), Mason Sabin (182) and Ryan Redford (195). Nate Belcourt (113) and Klein Carter (152) placed second while Jared Rodarte (138) and Eric Campbell (220) finished third for the top-ranked Hornets. White River outscored Orting 283 to 250 to claim top honors at the Region III tournament.

Four of the thirteen Orting qualifiers won regional titles. Conor Goucher (113), Jacob Flores (126), Alex Cruz (138) and Evan Barger (220) finished first and Chrys Cenkush (120) placed second. The Cardinals also had two third-place award winners and six wrestlers who finished in fourth place. Orting has more qualifiers than the other leading contenders but does not appear to have enough finalists to compete for a team title.

The fourth-ranked Wapato Wolves squad suffered through a rough regional tournament in Spokane. Returning state champions Jesus Rodriguez (120), Sergy Salas (126) and Alex Vaca (145) all lost. Rodriguez lost in the championship match 4-2 to Drury of Toppenish, Salas lost in the semifinal and came back to finish third and Vaca lost in the title match to Jake Freeman of Clarkston. Returning state champions have a way of overcoming obstacles, but those loses at regionals will make the state brackets more difficult for the Wolves. Rodriquez has the third and fourth-ranked wrestlers on his side of the bracket at 120. Salas has third-ranked Jacob Flores on his half bracket at 126 and Vaca will meet fourth-ranked Lyver of White River in the second match.

Othello hopes for a better result than the sixth place predicted by Washington Wrestling Report — just below Blaine and above East Valley of Spokane. The Huskies will be represented by regional champions Chris Melo (106) and Isaiah Perez (285) along with third place award winner Bernie Garza, Jr. (160) and fourth place finishers Juan Martinez (145), Easton Roylance (152) and DJ Guzman (195).

“You never know at the state tournament,” Ochoa II said. “I don’t see any reason why we should not be in the mix for a fourth spot.”

Four teams medal at the state tournament and the Huskies would love to return home with some hardware.