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Anthony Baza wins second straight CCS title
By Dick Sparrer
He did it again!
Anthony Baza of Fremont backed up a 2000 Central Coast Section championship with another title in 2001 at the CCS tournament held last weekend at Independence.
The talented senior wrestler won four straight matches after a first-round bye to win the title at 145 pounds.
Baza, the 135-pound champ at CCS last year, will now lead a group of three Fremont wrestlers to the state tournament at the University of the Pacific in Stockton on March 2-3, and he's looking for better luck than he had last year.
"He broke his hand on the Monday after CCS last year," said Fremont coach Bobby Soto of Baza. "We were devastated."
But Baza recovered to post a 40-4 record this year and win another CCS crown, and he led Fremont to a seventh-place finish in the team standings at the section tourney.
Chris Osian ended up second at 112 pounds, Kai Garcia was fourth at 125 and Bayardo Sanchez was fifth at 135 for the Firebirds. Osian and Garcia will join Baza for the trip to state.
Baza pinned Steven Sanchez of Hill in 3:18 and Alvaro Salas of Greenfield in 3:39 in his first two matches at CCS. He came back with a 13-5 win over James Lejsek of Bellarmine before nailing Izayas Castillo of Silver Creek 12-1 in the finals.
"We were exceptionally proud of his match in the finals," said Soto, indicating that Castillo in among the best in the state in the weight class. "[Anthony] beat him 12-1, and that put an exclamation point on what he hopes to do at state."
Osian opened the tourney with a 9-3 win over Raul Marin of Andrew Hill before pinning Justin Chan of Mills and Adam Ruiz of Gilroy. He beat Jamil Miller of San Benito 2-0 to get into the finals at 112 pounds.
"He had a real tough match in the semi's with a kid he lost to last year [Miller]," said Soto of Osian. "But he upset him to get into the finals."
Osian lost his last match to Joe Streu of Silver Creek, but had already locked up a state berth.
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
