College Wrestling: Second Year Program Colorado Mesa on Track – Season Preview
2019 WCWA All-American Sierra Brown Ton is bumping up to 130 this year. Photo courtesy of cmumavericks.com.
by Derek Levendusky, AWW staff writer
GRAND JUNCTION, CO – You better start paying attention to Colorado Mesa. When you set high goals and standards, recruit solid athletes, work hard and wrestle the best, the trajectory can become a rock climber’s pitch. That’s what we’re seeing at second-year program Colorado Mesa, where Coach Travis Mercado is building a culture of excellence. The Mavericks are currently ranked #6 in our NCAA Schools poll and are working hard to get ready to compete in the 2019-2020 women’s college season.
“Coming into the second year,” said Mercado, “I’m really excited having had a full year to recruit. Last year was instrumental. [Recruiting] was priority number one for us—trying to make sure we found the best-fitting girls for our program that really saw the long-term vision of what we want to accomplish here and the championship culture that we’re building. We have some fantastic young ladies that are eager to compete and grow.”
Mercado seeks to develop every part of his athlete’s lives. “Our main philosophy we preach here is striving for excellence in every-day-life. We’re not just going to be an excellent wrestler, we’re going to be an excellent athlete; we’re going to be an excellent student; we’re going to be an excellent daughter, sister, and as they get older, for some of these girls, mothers and wives—things of that nature.”
Looking to the upcoming season, he says, “I’m excited to get out there and compete. I really enjoy that part of coaching wrestling—being able to put the girls out there and see how much they’ve grown and developed over the course of a couple months. We’re not thinking win-lose. We’re thinking let’s go out there and wrestle our best, and give our best performance.”
After having their first-ever WCWA All-American last year in 123-pound Sierra Brown Ton, Mesa is returning several rising stars, and brought in a stellar recruiting class. The Mavs have four women ranked in the top 10 of our AWW individual poll and they’re ranked #6 as a team. After having only 13 on the roster last year, this season they’ve almost doubled that number, starting the year with 25 wrestlers.
Brown Ton’s All-American banner went up next to the men’s banners in the wrestling room. “She’s right between Bruno Nicoletti, who was All-American for the men’s team in 2018, and Eduardo Penha, who was an All-American last season,” said Mercado with a proud smile. “It’s pretty awesome. The girls get to see that every day and look toward Sierra as a role model.”
Brown Ton is not afraid to challenge her teammates either, says Coach Mercado. “She’s not afraid to say, ‘Hey, I need you to step it up because in order for me to continue growing and fully developing, that’s how I need you guys to work.’”
Mercado cut his coaching teeth at King from 2014-2018, where he watched the inner workings and cultural formation of a national championship program. Besides King head coach Jason Moorman, he also considers Emmanuel coach Link Davis and McKendree head coach Sam Schmitz mentors, all who instilled in him the values of excellence and not settling for mediocrity. He brings that same mentality to Colorado.
The Mesa team had an inner-squad “Maroon vs. Black” dual on Halloween Eve, getting into the weigh-in-competition rhythm in prep to travel to Plainview, Texas next week to face Wayland Baptist, the #7 ranked program in our WCWA team rankings, which ranks all college programs. Wayland Baptist was #1 last year when Mesa wrestled them, their first-ever dual in the history of their program. “We’re not afraid to search out those top-competition teams,” says Mercado. “I like competing. I want to make sure that we’re putting ourselves in a position where we see the best girls in the nation so that we can get a feel instead of running into them the first time at a national tournament where the stakes are a little bit higher.” In 2018-2019 regular season, Mesa was on the mats with 32-33 of the 40-plus programs in existence at the time. So by the time they went to WCWA Nationals, they’d already seen most programs. Mercado noted, “That helped us calm some of the nerves going into the national tournament.”
But for starters this year, it was Maroon vs. Black. “We’re just trying to replicate that competition environment and get those good butterflies going,” said Mercado of the inner-program dual. “Some of them haven’t wrestled since Fargo or Junior Trials.”
Here’s Colorado Mesa’s ranked wrestlers hitting the mat this season:
123 Marissa Gallegos, red shirt freshman / AWW Ranking: #4 NCAA, #8 WCWA
“Marissa is ready to compete,” Mercado said of Gallegos, coming off her true freshman red shirt season and recovering from an injury from which she wasn’t cleared until last January. “She did really well at Junior Trials and U23s, so she walked in ready to make some big strides this year as an individual.“
130 Sierra Brown Ton, sophomore / AWW Ranking: #5 NCAA, #9 WCWA
After finishing 8th at 123 pounds last year, Brown Ton will bump up to 130 this season. “The cut to 123 wasn’t awful,” explains Mercado, “but cutting every weekend was starting to drain on her toward the end of the year. So she’s grown in the weight room and feels great at 130. We’ve got some work to do, but I think we’re going to do a fantastic job. Same goals—be a national champion and try to make the Olympic Trials as well.”
143 Alma Mendoza, sophomore / AWW Ranking: #7 NCAA
Mendoza made the Junior Pan-Am team last summer. “Her having that experience of going to the Olympic Training Center, going to Guatemala [for Pan Ams], has really changed her outlook on a lot of things in her wrestling career and what she wants to accomplish. Being able to go to the OTC has put her in a position where she knows how practices are run and she comes in with a purpose for every single practice. The young girls see that and it extends that culture [of excellence].”
191 Emily Clawson, sophomore / AWW Ranking: #6 NCAA
After taking 5th at the Oregon Classic and 8th at the always-tough Missouri Valley Open last season, Clawson is getting ready to make a run at the podium this year in her sophomore campaign.
Top Recruits
Dalia Garibay (136 pounds)
The freshman from Brentwood, CA finished her high school career ranked #4 in the FloWrestling National High School Rankings. A 4x California state placer who finally broke through to a state title her senior year, the high school All-American was the national folkstyle runner-up last year in Oklahoma. “She’s already a leader in the room,” says the coach, “just in her actions. She comes in, straps it up, gets to work right away. She gets to wrestle with Sierra and Alma pretty much every day, so she has two very talented older girls who challenge her. I’m excited to see her get some college competition. I expect her to move up the rankings quickly.”
Cindy Zepeda (130 pounds)
The Palm Springs, CA native was ranked #20 in high school by FloWrestling and was a state champ as a senior. Mercado is pleased with her work ethic. “She’s a workhorse,” says the coach of the athlete that, he points out, also loves to smile and crack a joke. “She comes into the room, puts her head down and gets to work. She’s eager to learn so she’ll come after practice and be like, ‘Hey this didn’t work. Why didn’t this work.’ All of a sudden the light bulb will turn on.” He appreciates her fearlessness in the face of taking losses or getting scored on, pointing out that she’s not afraid to take her lumps to get better, a contagious immunity to adversity that he says has a positive effect on the team.
Jennesis Martinez (101 pounds)
Martinez has also stood out to the young coach. He says of the Albuquerque, NM native, a high school USAW Cadet national champion in 2015, who also won the Tricia Saunders High School Excellence Award as a senior, “I had high expectations for her coming in. Just getting to meet her and talking to some coaches, and when she came for her visit, she wasn’t afraid to jump in there with Sierra and Marissa who outweighed her 25-30 pounds. She’s still not afraid to jump in with some of the bigger girls. She going to be someone that surprises some people. I’m expecting big things from her.”
There are other incoming girls that will also make an impact.
Colorado Mesa is central to a lot of schools, but still ten hours in any direction to the closest women’s college program. Mercado is hopeful, as many are, that the rise of women’s wrestling at the NCAA level and the attention it’s now getting from the powers-that-be, will create more programs nearby in the future. He’s also excited for the opportunity this will give his young women. “I’m excited,” he says. “Everything has been moving fast and furious. That makes it scary and exciting at the same time. To have these young ladies that are here at my program starting [when women’s wrestling is gaining momentum in the NCAA], hopefully they’ll get to see the fruits of some of the labor of the coaches and people that have put this together and they’ll have their own NCAA Championship by the time they graduate. You know, go to a huge arena in a big city and have the NCAA logo all over everything and walk in and see your name and your school logo up on the big screen while you’re wrestling. I think that’s exciting. It’s time for it to happen.”
Regarding the potential of starting to separate governing organizations in the women’s college scene, Mercado is practical. “I think it’s time to start splitting and separating from the other organizations,” he said. “I know some other coaches feel the same way. It’s time for us to stand alone as an NCAA sport.”
Expect to see Colorado Mesa in the mix this year. Coach Mercado and his staff will be proudly marching their women to battle. “These girls are amazing,” concludes Mercado. “Obviously every coach is biased, but I think we have one of the best teams in the nation in all aspects. I’m excited for them to get the opportunity to compete. This is gonna be a fun year for us.”