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Photograph by Robert Scheer

Fremont's Jason Piamonte has a look of all business on his face (right) as he works for a win in the SCVAL mat inals. Piamonte finished third at 114 pounds.

Firebirds pin league titles

Fremont sends four wrestlers to CCS

By Dick Sparrer

If there's one thing that Jay Lawson knows well, it's wrestling--and more specifically, wrestling in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League.

So when the veteran Cupertino mat coach was sizing up things prior to the SCVAL finals at Palo Alto last weekend, observers were paying close attention to what he had to say.

And as it turns out, Lawson really knew what he was talking about.

The Cupertino boss picked Los Gatos, Los Altos, Monta Vista and his own Pioneers as the top four teams in the rugged league tournament, and that's just the way things turned out--though not exactly in the order Lawson expected.

He had picked Los Gatos as the title favorite, but Los Altos came up the surprise winner in the league tourney. Los Gatos was second, with Cupertino third and Monta Vista fourth. Only 30 points separated the top four teams in the tourney standings.

Los Altos, champs of the El Camino Division of the SCVAL, won the tourney crown with 177 points. Gatos, the De Anza Division champion, was a close second at 170 with Cupertino third at 152 and Monta Vista fourth at 147.

Three individual champions topped a list of 10 league placers for the runner-up Wildcats. Dan Benedetti, Rohner Segnitz and Fred Luminoso each won titles for Gatos.

Champs Eric Hawkins, Bobby Adams and Joey Conley sparked 'Tino to the team third. Cupertino had an impressive 13 placers in the 14 weight classes, eight of them qualifying for the upcoming Central Coast Section finals finals.

Monta Vista sophomore Jarrod Rothman won an individual title and headed up a crew of nine Matadors who placed in the league tournament.

Fremont also had quite a day at the league tournament. The Firebirds placed sixth as a team with five individual placers, but three Fremont wrestlers--Anthony Baza, Jamie Kashitani and Matt Sabraw--won division titles.

The top five SCVAL placers in each weight class move on to the CCS finals on Feb. 20-21 at Santa Clara High.

Fremont, like Los Gatos and Cupertino, had three individual champions at the league tournament.

Baza beat a Los Altos foe to win a title at 121 pounds for the Firebirds, and Kashitani outdueled Cupertino's Billy Hershey in the championship match at 137 pounds.

Sabraw gave Fremont its third title a match later with a win over a Santa Clara opponent in the finals at 142 pounds.

Jason Piamonte supported the effort for the Firebirds with a third-place finish at 114 pounds, and Elton Vallejos picked up a sixth at 173 pounds.

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This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, February 18, 1998.
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