The 3A wrestling tournament was hosted in the Tacoma Dome. Lasting two days, Peninsula sent eight kids to wrestle, ultimately putting Four of the eight boys placed on the podium. As a team, everyone did well to represent Peninsula.

Nolan Casey, Isaac Casey, Riley Wynn, Drew Ramsey, Seth Wahto, Brock Allen, Roger Kaffer, and Michael Campigotto all competed in the 3A Wrestling State Tournament. Of the eight boys, Wahto, Allen, Kaffer and Campigotto made it onto the podium. Wahto and Campigotto finished 3rd followed by Kaffer and Allen finishing 8th in their respective weight classes.

Wahto has wrestled varsity for all four of his years at Peninsula and wrestled for most of his life before high school. Wahto competed at state before, during his sophomore year. He was predicted to have competed in state his junior year as well, if he had not hurt his shoulder. Wahto was proud to finish off his senior year 3rd in state in the 145 pound weight class.

One could imagine that these big state tournaments exact a lot of pressure on the athletes to perform well. Wahto has learned to combat this pressure with a specific attitude.  

“Throughout all my matches I just treated it like any other match I’ve had,” said Wahto “I just went out there and wrestled my style of a match. I went out to dominate the competition. Out there, the matches are no different from any other match throughout the season.”

Michael Campigotto has also wrestled varsity all four years at PHS and has been a wrestler all his life. This wasn’t Campigotto’s first time at the state tournament: He has been to the tournament every year since freshmen year, the first Peninsula wrestler to do so. This year, Campigotto was able to finish off his high school wrestling career with a win, placing 3rd in state for the 126 pound weight class.

“My mindset was that I was going to go out there and wrestle every match like it was my last,” said Campigotto.

Senior Roger Kaffer, another state placer, has wrestled since 5th grade through high school, Wrestling varsity all four years at Peninsula. Despite this tournament being Kaffer’s first year at state, he placed 8th in the 182 pound weight class.

The state tournament is a different tournament than most though. Many take wrestling in the state tournament differently than all the others. Kaffer is one of those people.

“I thought it was an honor to wrestle some of the top athletes in the state alongside some of my teammates,” said Kaffer

Brock Allen is different than the other wrestlers who placed at state. While the other wrestlers were all seniors, Allen is a freshmen. This was his first year in high school wrestling , but it didn’t seem to faze him-he was already wrestling varsity. He was able to compete in the state tournament and place 8th in the 106 pound weight class.

Being a freshmen can add some extra pressure and make the tournament more nerve-wracking. However, Allen handled the stress of being a freshmen in a different way.

“[The pressure] mostly fueled my drive to wrestle for a place on the podium,” said Allen. “Not very many people at Peninsula have placed freshmen year and I wanted to join the few.”
Peninsula is very proud of all our wrestlers that participated in state. Even though our wrestling team is filled with seniors who are leaving after this year, our team also has a lot of young talent, like Allen, that will be stepping it up next year and leading the teams to wins.