A half dozen Lady Cougar wrestlers and a half dozen varsity Cougars placed in recent tournaments, continuing the preseason campaign on the mats.

For the girls, their early December trip to Atwater saw three girls return with third place honors, two with second place and one champion.

Isabella Alcala, 115 pounds; Sofia Duran, 130; and Helena Arroyo, 170, nailed down third place finishes. At 105 pounds, Yahira Munoz took second in just her second wrestling tournament and at 190 pounds, Aislinn Ingles also took second.

Earning first place honors, taking the championship at 120 pounds, was Miroslava Torres.

For the boys, they took part recently in the Riddle Memorial Classic hosted at Oakdale High School.

“It’s a really tough tournament, Bakersfield was there, Clovis was there, a lot of tough teams,” said head wrestling coach Derek Scott. “We brought 13 wrestlers and six of them placed.”

Eighth place finishers were Houston Sizeula, 120 pounds; Conner McDowell, 126.

In seventh place was Christian Cruz, 144; Luca Cerasi took sixth at 132 pounds. Heavyweight Frank Rodriguez earned a fifth place finish and Escalon’s highest placer in the tournament was John Konradi, finishing third at 190 pounds.

“Out of 35 teams, we took sixth place so I was happy about that,” Scott said. “But we lost some close matches that we need to find a way to win.”

Escalon will host the annual Lloyd C. Engel tournament on Friday and Saturday, Jan. 3 and 4.