Two wins in home meet give Warriors 3-1 dual meet wrestling record

Joe Naiman

Village News Reporter

A wrestling dual meet may actually be a tri-meet in which each of the three teams wrestles a full match against each team’s two opponents. Fallbrook High School began the Warriors’ dual meet season with a Dec. 9 tri-meet at San Pasqual High School and then hosted a Dec. 16 tri-meet.

The Warriors defeated Orange Glen while losing by one point to San Pasqual in the Dec. 9 tri-meet. Fallbrook’s first home meet of the season ended with a 47-36 win over Valley Center and a 60-21 victory against Oceanside.

High school wrestling has 14 weight classes. A wrestler can compete in the next-higher class than what he scales but not in a lower weight class. Fallbrook currently must forfeit either the 170-pound match or the 182-pound contest.

The Warriors were also without a 195-pound grappler for the December meets, but Warriors filled 12 weight classes. “We actually got to compete as a full team,” said Fallbrook coach Cristian Vera. “We almost have every single weight class filled.”

Wrestling has both individual scores and team scores. A wrestler is given one point for an escape, two points for a takedown, a reversal, or a near fall lasting two to five seconds, and three points for a near fall of at least five seconds. A win by decision provides three team points, a major decision which means a margin of at least eight points is worth four points, a 15-point margin triggers a technical fall which gives five points, and a pin or forfeit win adds six team points.

San Pasqual and Fallbrook each won two matches by forfeit during their competition against each other. The Golden Eagles did not have matmen in the 113-pound or 152-pound classes, giving sophomore Xavier Pacheco the 113-pound forfeit victory and senior Ethan Aguila the 152-pound forfeit win.

Fallbrook and San Pasqual each won five bouts contested on the mat, including four apiece by pin. Fallbrook senior Alex Brown won the 160-pound contest with a 13-12 decision and San Pasqual had a technical fall victory in the 182-pound bout. Wrestling team scores also include a one-point team penalty deduction if a wrestler takes off his singlet too soon and, with one of those penalties, the Golden Eagles defeated Fallbrook by a 40-39 score.

“It was down to the wire,” Vera said.

“I think what beat us more than anything else was the inexperience,” Vera said. “It was just simple mistakes.”

Often that mistake can lead to a wrestler being pinned. “We’re a young team and we made some young guy mistakes, but we held our own,” Vera said.

The four Fallbrook pin victories were obtained by 105-pound sophomore Nick Brockson, 120-pound freshman Daniel Wilson, 138-pound senior Marco Arias Jr., and 145-pound senior Aiden Lane.

Arias is the son of Fallbrook cross country coach Marco Arias but is not on his father’s cross country team. Wilson ran cross country during the fall and concluded his season with the CIF San Diego Section meet Nov. 20, so he missed the first two weeks of wrestling practice and the pin Dec. 9 was his first high school wrestling win. “That was a nice way to start by getting a pin,” Vera said.

“It was a really, really tight dual,” Vera said. “We fell a little short.”

The 48-30 win against Orange Glen reflected a double forfeit in the 195-pound class, a forfeit win for Brockson, and pins by Pacheco, Arias, Lane, Aguila, Brown, 182-pound junior Jon Nelson, and 220-pound sophomore Tank Benitez.

“I was happy with the result,” Vera said. “The only way it could have been better was if we started off 2 and 0.”

For six years Fallbrook and Valley Center were both in the Valley League. Fallbrook is now in the Palomar League along with Mount Carmel, Poway, Rancho Bernardo, Ramona, and San Marcos. The Warriors thus wrestled Valley Center as a non-league opponent along with Oceanside.

“Winning at any point is great, but winning at home feels that much sweeter,” Vera said. “The energy was fantastic tonight.”

The victories over Valley Center and Oceanside were Fallbrook’s first home wins since the 2019-20 season. “The energy was felt by the crowd,” Vera said. “It just made for a fantastic atmosphere.”

One Warrior team point in the match against Valley Center was deducted for a singlet removed too early. The Jaguars won the 170-pound and 195-pound matches by forfeit while Brockson, Pacheco and 126-pound senior Ethan Ellefsen won by forfeit. Arias, Aguila, Brown, Nelson, and Benitez pinned their Valley Center opponents.

Oceanside forfeited six of the seven lowest weight classes to give wins to Brockson, Wilson, Ellefsen, 132-pound junior Derrick Yap, Arias, and Lane. Pacheco, Aguila, Nelson, and Benitez defeated their opponents by pin.