01.10.08
Pressure cooker
driiler wrestlingOriginally uploaded by andynoise
Emphasizing success at the state tournament is one of the ways Bakersfield High’s wrestling program has built a strong tradition
BY ZACH EWING, Californian staff writer
e-mail: zewing@bakersfield.com | Wednesday, Jan 9 2008 8:50 PM
Last Updated: Wednesday, Jan 9 2008 8:52 PM
There’s something missing from the Bakersfield High wrestling room, and unless you look closely, you won’t find it.
Photos:
Photo by Casey Christie / The Californian
Bakersfield High wrestlers Javier Sanchez, left, and Jonah Cruz, workout together in the wrestling room at the start of the wrestling season.
It’s up on the list of BHS state champions, where a wrestler is listed by 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 …
Wait, isn’t it 2008? What happened to last season?
Three third places, but no champs.
“Up there on the board, you see the list of all the champs, and you’re going to miss a year, you know that,” said Travis Rasmussen, the Drillers’ 145-pounder and one of the third-place finishers.
It doesn’t seem fair that a school is expected to produce a state champion every single season. But the track record of individual champs — combined with team titles in 2002 and 2004 — has the pressure cranked up.
“The expectations are always high every year for these guys,” BHS coach Andy Varner said. “But we want it more than anyone.”
Bakersfield has had another successful early season, taking third place at the Zinkin Classic and fourth at the highly regarded Doc Buchanan Invitational last weekend, where BHS placed nine wrestlers in the top eight.
But the Drillers seem to treat those results the same way they looked at last year’s fifth-place finish in the state tournament.
Not good enough.
“I know I was disappointed,” Rasmussen said.
So is the bar simply being lowered, or will BHS rise again to the top?
Wait until Feb. 28. That’s when the state tournament begins at Rabobank Arena, the time and place where wrestlers are ultimately measured.
“It’s something we pound in their heads from the beginning,” Varner said. “It doesn’t matter what you do at the Doc B, it doesn’t matter what you do at (the upcoming) Five Counties, at these tournaments. It means nothing.
“All that matters is that you’re preparing and you’re striving towards your goal. And everybody’s goal here is March, getting to March. Get to March, get to state, get to that Rabobank Arena, and then anything can happen.”
BHS is considered the state’s No. 7 team, according to The California Wrestler Newsletter, and Rasmussen and 140-pounder Jonah Cruz are ranked in the top five at their weights. If the Drillers don’t exceed those expectations, 2008 could be another year that didn’t live up to the Bakersfield standard.
But the Drillers welcome the pressure.
“It raises your expectations,” 171-pounder Brad Carls said. “… The coaches are good enough here to say, ‘We can be better.’ You’ve got to earn it. So I really don’t think of it as a disadvantage, because I want to fill those shoes.”
Still, the pressure also can be a distraction.
Said Cruz: “You can only do what you can do. You get caught up in that mind frame and end up falling apart trying to meet other people’s expectations instead of your own goals.”
However, the more you listen to Bakersfield wrestlers, the more you realize that Varner’s right: The team’s own expectations probably are higher than anyone else’s.
Take Carls, who wasn’t allowed to wrestle with the varsity team in the upstairs wrestling room — the one with all the champions listed — when he started at BHS.
“I wanted to be one of those guys. When I finally came up here, it was like a dream come true, you know?” he said. “It’s a lot to live up to, all the tradition and stuff, but it’s a really cool thing and I think we can do it. We’ll hold up the standard of BHS.”
