The562’s wrestling coverage for the 2023-24 school year is sponsored by Emigh Dental Care.
The562’s coverage of Lakewood Athletics is sponsored by J.P. Crawford, Class of 2013.
Lakewood wrestler Ashley Wafer is as surprised as anyone that she went to Bakersfield for the CIF State Wrestling Championships and came home with a second-place and fourth-place medals. Wafer is proud of her accomplishments, but is a bit modest when it comes to her performance on the mat.
“I was honestly pretty shocked,” Wafer said. “I’m not really that athletic. On my team I feel like a lot of people are a lot better than me so it’s kind of weird that I was the one that went to state.”
After finishing second in her Moore League finals 235-pound match against Millikan’s Helen Martinez, Wafer qualified through the CIF Southern Section and Masters meet before being the lone representative from the Moore League at CIF State.
Wafer qualified at the CIF-SS finals with three wins, including a rewarding victory in a rematch with Martinez.
“It was really great because I knew that when I had lost to her I really wasn’t wrestling my best,” Wafer said of the rematch with Martinez. “So, when I did win against her, it felt really amazing because I got to tell myself, like, ‘I actually wrestled my best that time.’”
In the CIF-SS championship Wafer lost a 2-0 defensive battle with Santa Ana’s Lorelei Hartman.
Wafer wasn’t done there as her magical run continued into the Masters meet where she won three matches against Bonita’s Gaby Cervantes, Sante Fe’s Jaeleen McLellan and San Dimas’ Charlene Smith before losing to Liberty’s Anna Bozanic in the championship match.
Wafer’s season wasn’t done there as she qualified for state and the stage wasn’t too big for her as she won her first two matches against Stockton’s Victoria Franklin and Santa Ana’s Hartman.
Wafer would lose in the quarterfinals to Estella Vasquez-Gutierrez, but would get right back to winning in the consolation bracket where she was able to pick up wins against Sultana’s Savannah Etheridge and Sanger’s Yvette Garcia in a 1-0 decision.
Wafer capped her season with a victory against Central Valley’s Brianna Espinoza to take fourth place in the state.
