Albany High Girls Wrestling Team Captures CIF State Team Championship

• 126 pounds Chanel Chawalit (senior) finished in 1st place and is now a 2 time state champion. She won all of her matches in the tournament by pin. She finished her season with a 38 - 1 record, with 35 pins. 

• 131 pounds Erica Sotelo (junior) finished in 1st place. She went in the tournament ranked #4 and beat the #1 ranked girl in the semi-finals, and beat the #3 ranked girl in the finals. She finisher her season with a 39 - 4 record, with 33 pins. 

• 150 pounds Nallely Patino (junior) finished in 3rd place. She finished her season with a 32 - 6, with 26 pins. 

• 116 pounds Eva Piroth (sophomore) finished in 6th place. She finshed here season with a 36 - 6 record with 31 pins. 72 points. 

Of the win, Griffin told Patch, via email:

"We finished in 1st place as a team with 94 points, and the 2nd place team (Northview) had 72 points. We are the first team from the northern half of the state to win the state title since the Girls State Wrestling Tournament became official. It is also the first time in Albany High School history that any team has won the state championships in any sport. 

"The state of California is one of the only state that does not separate their state tournament by school size, therefore is one of the hardest states to win a state title in. For a team with just over 1300 kids total, it is a big deal to be able to beat out schools with 5000+ kids. Some of those teams have 30 + girls on their team. We have 8 this year. 

"We were also awarded top team in the nation at the tournament. This is the first year that a college coach decided to do a national ranking. The rankings had us bouncing between #2 and #4 throughout the season. After we won state he gave us the award (if you're wondering what the other trophy is in our hands)."

Do you know any of these students? Give the Albany High Cougars a shout out in the comments section.