UNION CITY — There’s no time to worry about your last match when you’re trying to reach the state tournament.
Upper Lake heavyweight Bradley Sneathen dropped a 4-3 heart-breaker to No. 1 seed Gerard Marshall of Hoopa in the 285-pound semifinals Saturday afternoon during the North Coast Section Boys Wrestling Championships in Union City, but he had little time to dwell on a fourth loss this season to Marshall, and a second straight one-point loss by decision to the Hoopa standout. If Sneathen wanted to reach next week’s CIF State Championships in Bakersfield, he had to win two more matches, so he went out and did it, including a triple-overtime 4-3 win over Shyloh Nicholson of Eureka in the consolation semifinals.
In the all-important third-place match that followed, Sneathen needed less than a minute to pin Toby Bunch of American Canyon High School to claim the final state berth available in his weight class. Talk about a nice finish.
“The most intense moment of a tournament like that is the championship match but the third-place match,” Upper Lake co-head coach Brandon Sneathen said. “The winner goes to state, the loser goes home.”
The Upper Lake senior began the second and final day of the sectionals as one of only three Lake County wrestlers still alive in the championship bracket and one of 12 left in the tournament. By day’s end, he was the only Lake County wrestler headed for Bakersfield and one of just four medalists (the top eight in each weight class receive medals), joining Lower Lake’s Quentin Vilmenay (fifth at 126 pounds), Kelseyville’s Travis Boyles (seventh at 106 pounds) and Middletown’s Dominick Clark (eighth at 113 pounds).
That select foursome had plenty to celebrate. Sneathen finished one place higher than his No. 4 seeding going into the sections while Boyles and Clark were both unseeded. Vilmenay finished exactly where he was seeded, fifth.
Sneathen, who is coached by his older brother Brandon, will be gunning for bigger game starting Thursday at the Mechanics Bank Arena in Bakersfield, home of the state tournament. Just as in the sections, the top eight wrestlers in each weight division win medals. The last county boy to bring home a state medal was another Upper Lake standout, Junior Fernandez, who placed fifth in 2019 at 132 pounds, that after finishing second at the sectionals the week before.
Losing to Marshall in the semifinals was a blow to both wrestler and coach alike, according to Brandon Sneathen.
“We were pretty heart struck, it was emotional for both of us,” Sneathen said. “We regrouped. We didn’t talk, just hugged it out. Our main goal was to get to state first and we had two more matches to win.”
“He (Nicholson) was the heaviest and tallest kid in the heavyweight division, so we knew it was going to be tough,” Sneathen said.
And it was.
Sneathen finally prevailed in the third overtime, scoring in the final seconds to snap a 3-3 tie.
“His wrestling IQ is what was the difference in the match,” Brandon Sneathen said. “He is a true heavyweight. He has the size but he also has the technical skills that a lot of wrestlers in this weight class don’t have. He’s a true heavyweight.”
His semifinal match against Marshall and his triple-overtime win over Nicholson set the stage for what proved to me an anti-climactic third-place match against Bunch, a wrestler Sneathen hadn’t faced this season.
“Another big guy, but Bradley put him to his back fairly quick,” Sneathen said.
It was all over in 49 seconds.
“The crowd went nuts,” Sneathen said of his brother’s quick pin.
In fact, it was 41 seconds more than Marshall needed to pin Aiden Rowe of De La Salle in the 285-pound championship match, which lasted all of eight seconds.
“That should have been the championship match,” Sneathen said of the Sneathen-Marshall semifinals earlier in theday. “They screwed up the seedings. Those guys should have been one and two.”
Is there a chance Sneathen and Marshall could meet a fifth time this season next week in Bakersfield.
“A good chance,” Brandon Sneathen said. “It just depends where they end up in the bracket.”
Like his younger brother this year, Brandon also reached the state finals for Upper Lake with a third-place section finish, and like Bradley, he lost by a single point in the semifinals, 2-1, before advancing out of the consolation bracket, so bouncing back is a family tradition.
“I was thinking about that after Bradley’s (third-place) match,” Sneathen said.
The Sneathens depart for Bakersfield on Wednesday.
Vilmenay
In a twist of fate often experienced at the sectionals, it’s not uncommon for wrestlers to meet each other twice in the tournament, which is what happened to Lower Lake’s Quentin Vilmenay and Justin-Siena’s Cooper Cohee in the 126-pound division. They opened Saturday against each other in the quarterfinals, Cohee winning 10-4, and then again in their final match of the day, Vilmenay prevailing 8-4 in the fifth-place match.
After losing to Cohee and entering into the consolation bracket, Vilmenay won consecutive matches, the first by pin, the second by 9-0 major decision, to reach the consolation semifinals. He needed one more victory to earn a shot at third place and a possible state berth, but MIles Garcia of Monte Vista High School edged him out 2-1.
Boyles
Kelseyville’s Boyles, knocked into the consolation bracket on Friday after a second-round loss, opened Saturday with three straight consolation victories, the first at the expense of Clear Lake’s Adrian Truby, who Boyles pinned. Needing a fourth consecutive victory to reach the consolation semis, Boyles dropped a 6-4 overtime heart-breaker to Tony Hernandez of Northgate High School.
Boyles came back with a 13-4 major decision over Ohia Paris of Campolindo High School in the seventh-place match.
Clark
Middletown’s Clark took the same route as Kelseyville’s Boyles to the medal podium Saturday after losing in the second round Friday. He won three straight matches, 8-0, 6-5 in an ultimate tiebreaker, and by first-round pin to reach the consolation semifinals where he dropped a 5-3 decision to Julius Ramos of Amador Valley High School.
Dropped into the seventh-place match, Clark was pinned in the first round by Ahnin Mornin of Albany High School.
“Great day for someone who wasn’t seeded,” Middletown assistant coach Brian Hunt said.
Day one
While Sneathen, Vilmenay, Boyles and Clark were the only Lake County wrestlers to bring home medals, eight other county wrestlers made it to day two, which is no small thing at a tournament as competitive as the sectionals. Others reaching day two before they were eliminated were Clear Lake’s Truby (106), Liam Davis (152) and Anthony Gersalia (170), Upper Lake’s Donavan Fernandez (126) and Joey Franklin (195), Middletown’s David Sypnicki (138) and Caleb Sternberg (152), and Lower Lake’s Adam Viramontes (220).
Davis, the No. 5 seed at 152 pounds, went 2-0 on Friday to reach the quarterfinals. He lost in the quarterfinals Saturday by 16-4 major decision to Isaiah Lee of San Ramon Valley High School, and then was eliminated after a 5-1 loss to Calin Capra of College Park in the consolation bracket.
Gersalia lost 3-0 in his first match Friday. Once in the consolation bracket, Gersalia won three straight matches — one on Friday, two more on Saturday — before dropping out of the tournament with a loss by pin to Jason Marshall of Hoopa.
Upper Lake’s Franklin was one win away from guaranteeing himself a medal of some sort when he was pinned by Nicholas Sherlock of De La Salle High School, ending his tournament after three straight consolation victories.
Likewise Sypnicki of Middletown also missed a medal of some sort by one win, dropping a 14-0 major decision to Jonathan Nishikawa of Monte Vista High School deep into the consolation round.
Streak lives on
When Vilmenay secured a fifth-place medal for Lower Lake at 126 pounds, it extended the school’s streak of winning at least one section medal to 12 years in a row (not counting 2021 when there was no tournament because of COVID-19).
Vilmenay’s performance was definitely the bright spot for a Lower Lake team that figured to have a good shot at matching the three medals it won in 2020, which tied a team record. Unfortunately, No. 3 seed Bryan Gudino at 106 pounds was unable to participate because of an injury and No. 7 seed Gabriel “Gordo” Ambirz at 132 pounds forfeited in the consolation round early Saturday, ending his tournament run. Lower Lake’s other medal hopeful, Viramontes, won his first consolation match Saturday before being eliminated.
CMC wrestlers
Outside of Lake County’s four medalists, the only other Coastal Mountain Conference wrestler to reach the medal podium was Charlie Nunnemaker of Willits, who placed fifth at 152 pounds.
