San Marcos Wrestling, led by four seniors, heads to District 26-6A meet

After a grinding season filled with numerous victories, San Marcos Wrestling will head to the District 26-6A meet this weekend, attempting to qualify for regionals.

The meet takes place at the Austin ISD Delco Activity Center Friday and Saturday. The team’s four seniors — A.J. Gonzales, Caitlan Hagerty,  Mason Moreno and Chris Soliz — are all ranked in the top 20 of their respective weight divisions in Class 6A by Wrestling Texas. Gonzales is listed as the No. 19 boys’ 170-pounder. Hagerty is ranked No. 16 among 119-pound girls. Moreno is No. 4 among 138-pound boys and Soliz is No. 3 among 182-pound boys

The Daily Record interviewed the seniors to discuss this season and the upcoming district meet:

Daily Record (DR): How has this season been different for you?

No. 3 Chris Soliz (CS): This year, we’ve been more intense on working in the actual wrestling room to where if our guys — because our guys aren’t really experienced — but we’ve got it to where conditioning is our biggest aspect. We can beat people like that.

No. 16 Caitlin Hagerty (CH): And we definitely, as seniors, have a much bigger leadership role this year, which is very new. And it’s very fun for me, I like to be in charge. I like to, you know, teach the new kids some stuff and it’s great to just get to show and pass down that knowledge that we’ve learned over the past three or four years. And it’s great to be, you know, captains and seniors and just get to be the upperclassmen passing down our baton.

No. 19 A.J. Gonzales (AG): This year, for me, it’s been pretty intense because like it’s my last year and this is pretty much all we got. So yeah, I give it my all like for everything I do.

No. 4 Mason Moreno (MM): This year has been really good … And mainly what I really feel like I should work on for like, practice-wise, is just keeping myself diligent on working hard. So basically my mindset right now is just to be as good as I can be.

DR: What’s it like stepping into that leadership role this year?

CS: Personally, I’ve always been like the person that has to grab, like, the snacks and stuff because we take it to the trips. But this year, I kind of can tell people more of like, ‘Hey, come grab this with me,’ and tell them, like, you need to do this a certain way. And people listen to me more because I’m an actual leader now.

CH: We get to take that knowledge that we’ve learned from our past seniors and our upperclassmen, our captains from prior years, and we actually get to take that and use it to make our team better. And we’re just growing every year and we’re making our team better and stronger and bigger every year because each year, the seniors, we go out and we bring in our freshmen that we’ve met or our underclassmen that play other sports that want to try something new. And we get to just bring out the wrestling team and we get to improve ourselves and expand what we have had in the past. And it’s really nice.

AG: For me, it’s like bringing in the new kids and welcoming them into our family. Like, this whole team is like one big family. Ever since my freshman year we’ve been super close and like everybody’s like, like they know each other well, and just like everything like a family. And so now like, I’m a senior, it’s my job to help the younger kids and everybody feels more welcomed.

CH: It’s definitely not like other sports. I’ve played other sports, the school, and they’re just — it’s more divided with the upperclassmen and the underclassmen. But in this team, even when I was an underclassmen, it’s always just been one big team and we’ve all just been a big family and no one is excluded. And if they feel excluded, they’re absolutely welcome to voice their worries and their concerns and we can just immediately address it. There’s no tension, there’s no hatred on this team. It’s just all love, it’s great.

DR: What’s been your favorite part of the season?

MM: Every day, when we wrestled, or like during the weekends, when we wake up early, when the sun is barely rising and we all go on a trip to the tournaments. That’s my favorite. It just feels like a kind of ritual, a ritual thing we always wake up to on Saturday. And it’s fun because like no one else is awake. We’re all getting up.

CS: Practicing every day — more of like the hard practices. Because afterwards, even though most of us are tired, we still have a smile on our faces and we’re all ready to go again.

AG: I missed my sophomore year (with leg injuries). And then I got hurt kind of towards the end of my junior year. so that’s that took me out of districts and regionals and all that.

Whenever I go into tournaments, I’m not the most like, looked out one, like, that’s the standout wrestler. And I like going in there and like proving everybody wrong and just showing people that I can wrestle pretty much.

CH: My favorite part of this year has definitely been getting to coach the new girls coming in. Last year it was only me and Gianna (Moreno) and sometimes Esperanza (Duran).

DR: What are you most looking forward to at the district meet?

AG: (My goal is) bringing home a medal these next three tournaments, basically. I’ve been out these past two seasons for these big tournaments and it’s redemption year. So, time to prove everything that I’ve got. My freshman year, I made it to regionals and had no idea what I was doing and still gave it everything I’ve got. So I’m ready for redemption.

MM: I feel like I should just prove to myself that I can do well. And as we’ve been saying, give it everything we’ve got. We’re seniors and we’re going to work as hard as we can to place — not even just place, but to strive to win.

CS: I think what I’m most ready for is to show my full potential. Because last year, in the state tournament, I did a lot worse than I should have. And this year, I can’t have those types of tournaments. I just gotta come out and show everybody. That’s what I’m looking forward to.

CH: It’s the last district (meet). You know, it’s the home stretch. You get to go out and you do your best, your very best — especially the seniors. This is your last chance to go out and make ourselves notable to any potential scouts or even the head coaches of the school or everybody else at the school. We get to put our name out there and let everybody know that this is us, we are wrestling, this is what this school is about.