After three straight years of finishing in either second or
third place at the Central Coast Section Wrestling Championships,
San Benito senior Junior Davila finally broke through on Saturday
night and claimed the 119-pound title when he defeated Gilroy’s
Rodney Balajadia in the finals.
SAN JOSE
San Benito’s Junior Davila didn’t win the 119-pound final against Gilroy’s Rodney Balajadia in the first 10 seconds on Saturday night. But then again, he did.
“I caught him with a throw,” Davila said. “I saw him open and it worked. Right after that, I broke him.”
The San Benito senior, who had finished in either second or third place in his weight class the last three years at the Central Coast Section Wrestling Championships, finally found the top spot on Saturday night at Independence High School in San Jose where he made lightning-quick work of Balajadia in the 119-pound final.
After building a 10-0 lead on the Gilroy grappler, Davila earned the victory when the match was called due to injury default in the second round at 2:35. As San Benito’s lone representative, Davila will advance to the CIF State Wrestling Championships for the fourth time, the first time as a CCS champion.
Runner-up never crossed his mind.
“I wasn’t thinking that. I didn’t want to go through that again,” said Davila, who went 5-0 at 119 pounds and is now 37-3 on the year. “I wanted to prove a point to my coaches … to do something at state.
“It’s pretty big because it will probably give me a good spot in the (state) bracket.”
Saturday’s convincing outcome, although not at all different from the previous two times Davila and Balajadia met earlier in the year, did come as a surprise to some, however. After all, Davila defeated Balajadia by a narrow 6-3 decision during a league dual earlier this month, then again at the Tri-County Athletic League Championships by an even tighter 7-5 result.
Saturday’s CCS championship match between the top two seeds at 119 pounds was all Davila, though.
“He’s the scariest guy in the state to wrestle at 119 pounds,” San Benito head coach Brian DeCarli said. “That doesn’t mean he’s the best wrestler in the state, but he’s capable of being the best wrestler. He’s capable of putting together a match like that against anyone.
“Keeping that emotion going, it’s hard to stop.”
On Saturday night, at least, Davila was scary good, and that emotion was evident within the first 10 seconds.
Knowing Balajadia would look to make a quick shoot for his left leg early on, Davila blocked the attempt, leveraged underneath Balajadia’s right shoulder, and threw him across his body for a punishing takedown in the first 10 seconds of the match, picking up a 3-point near-fall in the process.
“I knew he wanted to get that shot in,” said Davila, who also earned the sportsmanship award on Saturday. “I was working on that and I was ready for it, but I made the first move this time.”
Seconds later, after trying to push Balajadia over and onto his back, Davila instead quickly pulled the Gilroy wrestler in the opposite direction and spun him around onto his shoulders, scoring another 3-point near-fall.
Davila led 8-0 just 59 seconds into the first round when the match was first stopped for injury.
“I threw him pretty hard,” Davila said of the first takedown. Balajadia was tended to on the mat during the stoppage, using up all of his injury time in the process. The Gilroy wrestler returned, but after Davila scored another quick takedown in the second round, the match was officially stopped by Gilroy head coach Greg Varela.
“I was really worried about Rodney,” Varela said. “He is probably mad at me right now for stopping (the match), but I want to make sure he’s ready for state.”
The loss didn’t affect the Mustangs’ final score much. Gilroy went on to win its eighth straight CCS title when it racked up 258 points, easily defeating second-place Saint Francis by 65 points.
Bellarmine (120 points), Los Gatos (115.5) and Cupertino (107) finished in spots third, fourth and fifth, respectively, while the Balers garnered 100 points to grab sixth place overall.
Expecting to qualify 11 of 14 wrestlers to the second day — only four advanced to Saturday — DeCarli was disappointed after only four Balers found the podium on Saturday night.
“We want the best for our kids,” said DeCarli, who was expecting six to earn medals on Saturday. “When they don’t get there, it’s hard to swallow.”
Nevertheless, Zack Rodriguez (3-3) finished sixth at 130 pounds, Eric Henry (5-2) was fifth at 135 pounds and Tim Christenson (5-3) finished sixth at 145 pounds.
And each of them had an interesting story getting there.
Rodriguez suffered minor concussions at both the Fehlman/Baxter tournament and the Coast Classic in mid-December, and was held out of San Benito’s lineup until the week of the TCAL Championships; Christenson took two years off from wrestling to focus on baseball, only to return his senior year and become a league champion; and Henry didn’t get pulled up to the varsity lineup until midway through this season.
After battling back through consolation, Henry even defeated Aaron Marquez of Santa Cruz in the fifth- and sixth-place match by a 13-4 major decision — a wrestler the San Benito senior lost to by a 4-3 margin at the Jim Root Classic in mid-January.
“My stamina has been a lot better and my confidence was high going in,” said Henry, who ran eight miles a day during the two weeks leading up to CCS. Henry didn’t expect to make it as far as he did after he injured his shoulder last Tuesday in practice, but the pain subsided over the weekend.
“I think all the adrenaline helped me out, made the pain go away,” Henry said.
An injury default against Andy Kreidle of Los Gatos placed Rodriguez sixth at 130 pounds on Saturday. The consolation match came one day after the San Benito junior defeated the higher-seeded Kreidle by a 5-4 decision to advance to the semifinals in the championship bracket.
“I wrestled good yesterday and not so good today,” Rodriguez said simply.
The CCS Championships were a new experience for Izadela Meza Sanchez, a San Benito junior who wrestled in the Girls Wrestling Championships at Independence High on Saturday. Sanchez went 2-2 to finish in fourth place at 114 pounds.
“I did bad today,” Sanchez said. “Usually when I go against girls, it’s easy to pin them.”
Only a junior, Sanchez has another year to improve, and she was plenty of motivation. Next year’s state girls championships are said to be held in the Bay Area.
“Normally, the state competition is down south,” Sanchez said.
“I’m gonna have to start pumping iron.”
Staff writer Josh Weaver contributed to this story.
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Central Coast Section Wrestling Championships
TEAMS
1. Gilroy 258.0
2. Saint Francis 193.0
3. Bellarmine 120.0
4. Los Gatos 115.5
5. Cupertino 107.0
6. San Benito 100.0
7. Oak Grove 96.0
8. Fremont 93.5
9. King City 85.0
10. San Lorenzo Valley 74.0
11. Overfelt 65.5
12. Mitty 63.5
13. Serra 63.5
14. Alisal 60.5
15. Monterey 58.0
16. South San Francisco 57.5
17. Mount Pleasant 55.5
18. Aptos 54.0
19. Palma 52.0
20. Riordan 50.0
21. Gunn 48.0
22. Palo Alto 48.0
23. Prospect 47.0
24. Half Moon Bay 41.0
25. Homestead 41.0
26. Wilcox 40.5
27. Salinas 38.0
28. Sobrato 37.0
29. Los Altos 37.0
30. Leigh 35.0
31. Pacific Grove 35.0
32. Watsonville 30.0
33. Independence 29.0
34. North Monterey County 29.0
35. Andrew Hill 27.0
36. Hillsdale 27.0
37. Silver Creek 26.5
38. Saratoga 26.5
39. Santa Teresa 26.0
40. Burlingame 23.5
41. Greenfield 23.0
42. El Camino 23.0
43. Santa Clara 22.5
44. Live Oak 22.0
45. Harker School 16.5
46. Leland 16.0
47. Westmont 16.0
48. Milpitas 16.0
49. Santa Cruz 15.0
50. Harbor 14.0
51. Sequoia 13.5
52. Terra Nova 13.0
53. Scotts Valley 13.0
54. Menlo-Atherton 12.0
55. Monta Vista 10.0
56. Soledad 9.0
57. Everett Alvarez 9.0
58. North Salinas 9.0
59. Willow Glen 8.0
60. Carmel 8.0
61. MTAL-Gonzales 8.0
62. Oceana 8.0
63. Soquel 7.0
64. Sacred Heart 7.0
65. James Lick 6.5
66. Woodside 6.0
67. Lincoln 5.0
68. South San Francisco 3.0
69. Seaside 1.0
San Benito Haybalers
103 — Anthony Gatto, 0-2, DNP
112 — Robb Rodriguez, 2-2, DNP
114 — Izadela Meza Sanchez, 2-2, 4th
119 — Junior Davila, 5-0, 1st
125 — Jay Garcia, 1-2, DNP.
130 — Zack Rodriguez, 3-3, 6th
135 — Eric Henry, 5-2, 5th
140 — Mikey Soto, 3-2, DNP
145 — Tim Christenson, 5-3, 6th
152 — Edgar Ortega, 0-2, DNP
160 — N/A
171 — Luke Diller, 0-2, DNP
189 — Miguel Martin Del Campo, 2-2, DNP
215 — Adam Davis, 2-2, DNP
285 — Nick Angelo, 0-2, DNP
