ALBANY — Upper Lake High School has three seeded wrestlers, including No. 1 Lexy Peregrina at 150 pounds, through to the quarterfinals at the North Coast Section Girls Championships at Albany High School.
The two-day competition wraps up Saturday. The top four wrestlers in each weight class advance to the CIF State Championships beginning Thursday in Bakersfield while the top eight receive section medals.
Four other county wrestlers also open Saturday in the quarterfinals — Middletown’s Nicole Pyzer at 101 pounds and Krystal Ocken at 170 pounds, Lower Lake’s Hanahi Barocio at 121 pounds, and Clear Lake’s Nicole Buechler at 189 pounds. They join Upper Lake’s Peregrina, Tatum Salas (126 pounds) and Maddy Young (131 pounds).
Upper Lake
Peregrina, a freshman, won her only match of the day, that by pin, to reach the 150-pound quarterfinals. Salas, a senior and the No. 3 seed at 126 pounds, had only one match as well after receiving a first-round bye. She needed only 81 seconds to pin her opponent. Young, a senior and the No. 3 seed at 131 pounds, had a bit more work to do as she pinned each of her first two opponents, both in the first round.
Young then traveled back to Upper Lake to play in the Cougars’ quarterfinal-round playoff basketball game against Head-Royce, which the Cougars won 56-38.
Middletown
Pyzer, a senior, scored a pair of quick first-round pins at 101 pounds, spending less than two minutes on the mat in total. Ocken, a sophomore who has been out with an injury all of 2023, will have to wait until Saturday to wrestle her first match as she received a bye on Friday to reach the quarterfinals.
Lower Lake
Barocio, a senior and No. 6 seed, pinned her first opponent and won by 6-2 decision in the second round to advance to the quarterfinals.
Clear Lake
Buechler won her only match of the day, needing only 43 seconds to pin her opponent.
Consolation bracket
Six county wrestlers are still alive in the consolation bracket entering day two and can still place as high as third. Reaching the third-place match means advancement to the state meet.
That group includes three Clear Lake wrestlers — Anyssa Perez (2-1) at 106 pounds, Sophia Percaccio (2-1) at 116 pounds and Addyson Munoz (2-1) at 137 pounds — as well as Middletown’s Cat Barriga (2-1) at 106 pounds, Kelseyville’s Evangeli Lolonis (2-1) at 131 pounds, and Lower Lake’s Mirabol Swank (0-1) at 150 pounds.
