This past weekend, Pine Creek Wrestling took home 1st place out of  13 teams in the CHSAA 5A Region 4 regional tournament. Pine Creek won the tournament with 274 points, which was 90 points higher than the 2nd place team, Brighton. Making it Pine Creek Wrestlings’ 3rd consecutive tournament win. This tournament showed who had the skills to take place in one of Colorado’s most difficult tournaments, the state tournament. It was quite a special one for all of the varsity seniors due to them all qualifying. When talking to Austin Perigo(12 )about his approach to the state tournament for the first time, “I’ve been preparing physically for this weekend for 4 months so now it’s time to execute. Also, with it being my senior year, I just want to go out and have as much fun as possible because that’s what sports are all about.” and Josiah Ornelas(12) “I’m going to show up and wrestle to the best of my ability. Even though this is my 3rd year of wrestling, and the kids I’m wrestling against have been wrestling for their whole lives, I’m gonna go into that stadium with the mindset that I can do it.” Returning senior Nate King(12) placed 5th last year and sets to win it all this year, after taking 1st at all 3 tournaments in the past month, we asked how these tournaments would play a part in taking home the state championship, “Everything plays a part in winning a state title. I’ve been working a long time to be a state champion and all the work I’ve put in helped me to win other tournaments along the way.” Elijah Banks(10) a returning state qualifier also shared his thoughts on previous tournaments building up to the state tournament “These past tournaments allow me to get more matches, each win just adds another stack to my confidence which is really important in the sport of wrestling.” When talking to Pine Creek Wrestling’s head coach Bill Gabel about these tournaments and how they all converge to state championships and how it allows Pine Creek to compete with the top schools in Colorado, “Well in most athletics 90% of its mental, then you have the 10 to 20 percent that’s physical that needs the mental aspect, the weights, and the training are all important but if you do not believe then it doesn’t matter, guys winning these tough matches definitely builds confidence.” Pine Creek wrestled in the state tournament from Thursday, February 16th to Saturday, February 18th.