Despite the freezing temperatures that reddened noses and ears, faculty, students, and community members gathered at the front entrance of Montezuma-Cortez High School on Wednesday to send their best wishes to the seven wrestlers in a warm send-off.
The team was escorted out by the Cortez Fire Protection District and the Cortez Police Department, which led an exciting chorus of sirens to give the Panthers a memorable trip to Denver for Colorado High School Wrestling Tournament at Ball Arena Thursday through Saturday.
At the start of the season, M-CHS boys head wrestling coach Ryan Daves expressed his goal of guiding several athletes to the state tournament and boosting overall confidence. With the addition of the girls team, seven wrestlers have stepped up for the journey to Denver.
“The biggest thing we really tried to focus on this year is believing in yourself,” Daves said Wednesday morning at the send-off. “There’s a lot of tough kids all over the state, but we’re tough too. We put in the time, effort and hard work to get where we’re at now.”
Ashton Orr, Bodie Stiegelmeyer, Rusty Snyder, Keaton Curleyhair, Paislee Mestas, CeJae Snyder, and Aubrey Rutherford earned a spot at the state competition after qualifying in regional tournaments last weekend. They will compete at the Ball Arena in Denver starting Thursday. This will be almost everyone’s first visit to the Arena, except for Stiegelmeyer, who qualified last year.
The boys team said they were most excited about the competition and that it was all their goals to qualify for state.
“It’s quite an accomplishment for me,” said Curleyhair, who is a sophomore, “The competition I’ll be seeing at state will help me propel forward to match that level of competition for the next seasons as well.”
The girls wrestling team made history simply by participating in its inaugural season. Now, CeJae Snyder, Mestas and Rutherford are making their mark as part of the first-time qualifiers.
M-CHS girls head wrestling coach James Snyder said it had been an exciting season guiding the girls team and being part of that journey.
“It’s been unbelievable fun this year. It has been way better than we ever expected,” said Coach Snyder on Wednesday morning. “We told them they made it to the big show, now we met that goal, and now our next goal is to win the next matches at state.”
Mestas is also representing Mancos. As one of the most experienced wrestlers on the girls team, she stepped onto the mats at Montezuma-Cortez alongside CeJae Snyder, and both qualified for state as freshmen.
Senior Aubrey Rutherford also helped lead the team and expressed her optimism for the upcoming competition.
“I’m hoping we all do good this weekend,” Rutherford said. “We’re all good wrestlers, we fought for this moment right here, and hopefully a lot of us do good this weekend and fight hard for it.”
Each team will begin state competition on Thursday and throughout the rest of the weekend in Denver.
