Men's Tournament:
Each club showed up strong and everyone had a lot of fun battling. At the end of the day it was Spring Klein with a perfect 7-0, winning the championship trophy. The team was solid from top to bottom and all the guys wrestled outstanding. Right behind them was Coach Forsman's VICI wrestling club with a close second place finish, 6-1. They had a good dual with the champs keeping it close after forfeiting the first weight class. Just behind them is where it got pretty good amongst the others! The 3F team was missing quite a few big guys but as always, were still extremely competitive with the ones they brought. After a criteria win over NB Elite, they really got the ball rolling, winning the last three duals. NB Elite, despite starting four eighth graders, had a good start winning the first three duals and had a couple a tight ones with Takedown Elite and 3F . However, after the fourth round they would lose a few to injury, and forfeit four weight classes. Takedown Elite was missing a few of their studs but filled the lineup with a lot of young talent such as Trebor Moreno. They would be led by veteran Isiah Delgado. The team stayed tough and were right in the mix of things until the very end. It was Boneyard that was steadily chipping away through the bracket and grabbed the third-place finish in the men's division. They brought a good mixture of young wrestlers, as well as upperclassman, and they performed! CobraKai had a good full bench and battled tough throughout the day as well. The club is rich with talent and Coach Thomas is getting them the experience they need. All Valley wrestling club brought a team full of freshman and sophomores! We watched these guys closely all day as they were going up against Fargo All Americans, and state champions. We were curious to see how they would hold up after the first three or four rounds. It was very impressive how Coach Rendon kept their spirits up and the young wrestlers kept walking out there with a lot of try, and kept competing the whole tournament.
High school state finalist and returning Fargo AA Chase Worden was wrestling up from his normal weight, and bumped up to wrestle 2x state champ Daniel Manibog. Exactly what we were hoping the tournament structure would encourage. Let's just say the match was a good one, and if you were there you were fortunate enough to know how it turned out , if you weren't not only did you miss a good one, you can't even look it up. Knowing Daniel he was happy about that match as well. This is a guy who went at a specific weight class at the freestyle state tournament to go after another HS state champion before he left for college. Unfortunately that one did not happen. We had the same thing with freestyle state champion Robby Silva . He was at 138 and asked if he could bump up to wrestle HS state champion Trent Dooley. It was great to see these guys just go out and wrestle, not care about what was under their name and picture on a profile page. They just wanted the opportunity to go up against the best, and to get better.
There were many good ones in the tournament. 2x State champion and 3X finalist Isaiah Delgado of Takedown Elite, I believe teched everybody he wrestled; the same goes for 2x time state finalist, 3x place winner Jordan Strmiska. There were others that went undefeated; like State Champ, 4x place winner and SU commit Christian Moreno . However this year's outstanding wrestler went to Trent Dooley of the VICI wrestling team. Trent absolutely pounded the competition! The guy wrestles with a physicality that was unmatched. Congratulations to Trent on his performance at the first annual SU Freestyle Duals.
Women's Tournament:
The inaugural women's tournament brought in many of the best girls in the state. Out of the Houston we had Coach Thomas and the CobraKai team who brought a full bench. Spring Klein also filled a bench and their team was stacked! From El Paso Coach Martinez of Takedown Elite showed up with an outstanding team, they were young but extremely good. From Dallas/Fort Worth was Spartan and San Antonio NB Elite. Both of these teams were a little bit light in numbers but not in talent! We put them together to make a strong bench and give the other teams good competition. There were many good duals in the tournament and all of the teams were very competitive.
At the end of the day it was Spring Klein walking away with the the first place Trophy! The team was outstanding, a great mixture of very good young talent, and extremely experienced veterans.
They had a good dual with Takedown Elite, and two very good ones with "Team X" (Spartan,NBElite). All teams had a couple matches with each other. They did a great job of moving their lineups around to get in there extras and get the best matches for their wrestlers.
In second place it was Takedown Elite! Again, Coach Martinez did not bring all of his best girls on this team but he brought a talented bunch no doubt! Most of them new to the style, they battled hard and found a way to win the ones they needed to. This young team will definitely be "in it to win it" in the near future.
In third place it was Cobrakai wrestling club. They had a strong group of girls who competed very hard. The effort was good enough to bring home some hardware and create some momentum moving forward.
There were definitely some outstanding matches. Team X taking on Spring Klein provided some great watching. Senior state place winner, Madison Guinn had a couple of great matches with state champion Matty Parker. Both matches displaying extreme physical wrestling, and both girls showing their toughness. We had some young ones in the tournament really show what they were made of . Seventh grader Michaela Guerra of NB Elite winning all but one match against the older competition. Other stand out performances came from the younger sisters of SU commits Nathaniel Sandquist and Brodey Beckman. Ninth grader Madison Sandquist went the distance with a few outgoing seniors, pushing the matches to the last seconds to determine the W. Avery Beckman a sixth grader of Vici wrestling club, gets a fall over a senior state place winner! Both of these young girls are exceptionally talented coming out of the Houston area.
There were many good matches that were put together throughout the day. Such as Fargo All Americans Camille Fournier and Xochitl Mota-Pettis! Camille up in weight, went right at Xochitl taking her down right to a trapped arm gut. However she couldn't quite end the match and Mota-Pettis did what good ones do, she got right back up and got after Fournier.
Kaylynn Albrecht going up a weight class to wrestle Hunter Robinson! It was a match that both of their coaches wanted to see happen. Two big strong girls both wrestling extremely well in the tournament. It was a great opportunity for both of them and they took advantage of it. A lot of good matchup's went on until everyone said they were done and had enough.
There were tons of exceptional performances. Sierra Brown-Ton looked really strong, as did Maddison Brown and Matty Parker. Alicia Messer, SU commit, showed her freestyle experience when she knocked off not only a UIL state place winner by fall, but teched and pinned this year's UIL state champion. Heading down toward the right weight class, she's getting good in the right style at the right time.
Lots of great performances by many of these girls. One of the most physically dominating wrestlers on the mat Sunday, and this year's SU freestyle duals OW, goes to Kaylynn Albrecht who only gave up one point the entire day, and wrestled some of the best in the state in the process. Congratulations Kaylynn on an absolutely dominant performance at the inaugural SU freestyle duals.