No Rattler wrestlers advance to finals

The Tucumcari wrestling team delivered a suboptimal performance Saturday at the St. Michael’s tournament at Santa Fe, with no Rattler athletes advancing to the finals.

These wrestlers advanced to their respective semifinals, lost and then were eliminated in the losers’ bracket: Isiah Garcia (120 pounds), Charles Prieto (128), Dezmon Pacheco (132), Antonio Gonzales (160), Josh Pacheco (152) and Xzander Garcia (170).

“We started out good, but it was just a flat weekend,” Rattlers coach Eddie Encinias. “In the wrestlebacks, we did all right in the first round but …

“Maybe my expectations were too much early in the season,” Encinias said after a brief pause. “But they lost to guys that if they wrestled them, they’d beat them nine out of 10 times. We just looked very flat, very non-energized. My wrestlers are good wrestlers; they just had a bad weekend.”

On a bright note, Tucumcari finally landed a heavyweight wrestler it needed. Khobie Salvador, a senior, went out for the team and scored two victories Saturday.

“He did it just on brute strength,” Encinias said of those two wins. “Once we teach him technique, I think he’s going to be pretty good by the end of the season.”

The 12-team Ratter Invitational is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. Saturday at the Snake Pit, with the semifinals and finals commencing in the afternoon. Three teams from Texas dropped out of the event because of New Mexico’s mask mandate.