FREMONT, CA – Feb 2, 2013 – Action from the 2013 Mission San Jose Invitational.
Finals (click to see the photos)
Semi-Finals (click to see the photos)
[Text courtesy Contra Costa Times.]
The Clovis High wrestling team put on a show at the 38th annual Mission San Jose Invitational in Fremont on Saturday.
The Central Section power put 10 individuals in the finals, had six champions and finished with a whopping 321 points. De La Salle finished second with 143 points, followed by James Logan (135.5).
“Clovis is a good school,” James Logan’s 195-pounder Clayton Hartwell said. “But that doesn’t mean you can let their wrestlers wrestle their style.”
Hartwell wasn’t buying into the Clovis mystique.
The junior, ranked No. 10 in the state by www.thecaliforniawrestler.com and the No. 2 seed, had one of the more thrilling matches of the day when he upset No. 4-ranked Matt Weiss, of Clovis, the tournament’s top seed, 7-6 for first place.
Biggest win of his career?
“Yes,” he said emphatically.
Coming off a year during which he suffered a broken left elbow in his first match at the state meet, Hartwell is out for vengeance. He was trailing 4-0 entering the second period but closed to within 4-3 with an escape and a takedown. He fell behind 5-3 after an escape, but tied the match at 5-5 with a takedown with 13 seconds left in the second.
An escape early in the third gave Weiss a 6-5 lead. After that, Weiss, trying to hold on for the win, was nearly called for stalling.
But with 20 seconds left, Hartwell saw an opening for a takedown, got it and claimed a 7-6 lead.
“He was in no position to shoot,” Hartwell said. “I felt like if I got position, I could get it. A win like that boosts my morale.”
Hartwell was just one of two East Bay champions. The other was Livermore’s Tyler Rardon, the No. 1 seed at 152 pounds who posted a 5-4 win over Clovis’ Dominic Kincaid — the No. 2 seed.
Rardon, who is ranked No. 10 in the state, won a defensive battle against No. 11 Kincaid. The match was scoreless after the first period. In the second, Rardon scored three points on a near-fall and took a 3-2 lead into the third period.
Things got interesting in the third when — after an escape for a 4-2 lead — Kincaid scored two points for a takedown to tie the match at 4-4. But, with exactly a minute left, Rardon scored a point with an escape and held on for the victory.
“This benefits me,” Rardon said about the tournament’s competition. “You get to see what talent is out there and what you’re made of.”
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