They’re Wrestling Well at This Level, Too

Richard Bailey, Mark Gerardi and Tim Briggs lead an impressive list of former San Diego County high school wrestlers performing well in college.

Bailey, who won 115- and 129-pound section titles while at Valhalla, is ranked No. 2 in the NCAA at 150 pounds after finishing third in last year’s championship tournament.

With a title this season at the prestigious Nevada Las Vegas tournament, Bailey, a senior, is undefeated and aiming for an individual national championship while competing for No. 15 Cal State Bakersfield.

In his way is Brian Dolph of Indiana. Dolph is ranked No. 1 by the Amateur Wrestling News but lost an overtime decision before the final in the UNLV tournament.

“I would think Bailey’s got a real good shot to be national champion this year,” said Ron Good, editor of the Amateur Wrestling News. “He’d be the first Bakersfield wrestler to win one since 1980. And it’s probably one of the toughest weights in the tournament.”

Also from Valhalla, Gerardi was one of the most heavily recruited athletes in county history after winning three section titles in three different weight classes. He eventually chose No. 12 Notre Dame.

After two relatively obscure seasons in low weight divisions, he jumped to 167 pounds and is now ranked ninth with a 13-2 record.

Briggs, who graduated from Granite Hills, won section titles at 135 and 141 pounds before choosing the University of North Dakota, a Division II school. Last year, Briggs won the Division II championship at 158 pounds.

Briggs, a senior, is ranked No. 10 in Division I this season with a 15-2 record and is eligible for the Division I title.

Jake Gaier, last year’s 148-pound section champ from Granite Hills, is a red-shirt freshman at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. His brother, Aaron, who won the state 158-pound title at Granite Hills in 1988, won his second community college state championship this year for Palomar College.

Another Palomar wrestler, Chris Winkler of Monte Vista, finished third in the state meet, losing by a point in the semifinals at 134 pounds.

Tom Vardell, who won the section 194-pound championship in 1987 while at Granite Hills, will begin wrestling as a heavyweight for Stanford this year. Vardell was the Stanford football team’s second-leading rusher this season with nearly 300 yards.

Out of 293 NCAA Division I college basketball teams, San Diego State was ranked 168th, the University of San Diego 209th and U.S. International 269th in last week’s USA Today computer power rankings.

The paper also listed strength of schedules. USIU has the toughest of the three with a rating of 75.48. SDSU is next with 72.78, followed by USD with 70.92. UNLV has the nation’s toughest schedule with a 86.01 rating.

Of course, the only number coaches really concern themselves with is the team’s record. SDSU is 6-4, USIU 4-9 and USD 3-7.

Scott Barrick, Palomar College’s record-setting quarterback, is the 1989 recipient of the Joe Roth Award given in memory of the late Grossmont College and Cal quarterback for outstanding performance in community college football.

Some of the nation’s best small college women’s teams will be here for the UC San Diego’s basketball tournament Thursday through Saturday.

Thursday’s lineup for the eight-team, single-elimination tournament: Point Loma Nazarene (4-2) vs. Pennsylvania’s Franklin & Marshall (7-0) at 2 p.m.; Occidental (2-5) vs. Iowa’s Simpson (5-2) at 4; New York’s Rochester (2-7) vs. Missouri’s William Jewell College (3-5) at 6, and UCSD (2-4) vs. New Jersey’s William Paterson College (7-1).

When Christian Heritage and Point Loma Nazarene men’s teams met Nov. 28 in Point Loma, the teams scored 185 points in a wild game won by Christian Heritage, 101-84. Christian Heritage had three players with more than 20 points (Mark Kraatz 25, Brad Soucie 24 and Rob Meeter 21) and PLNC two (Mike Flores 27 and Ron Hubbard 24).

They meet again Saturday night at Grossmont College at 7:30 p.m.

According to the latest NAIA men’s basketball listings, Flores leads the conference in rebounding (11.4 average) and Kraatz in assists (9.4). Soucie was third in scoring (23.1) and Hubbard fourth (23.0).