For the second consecutive year, a Morris brother represented Redwood at the State Championship wrestling meet in Bakersfield.

Nathan Morris, junior, qualified for State this year after his brother Dylan, who is now wrestling for Stanford, became the first Redwood wrestler ever to medal at the State meet last year.

Although Nathan was eliminated after losing his first two matches, he still managed to add a second straight MCAL title and third place NCS finish to his resume in the 170-pound division.
Nathan’s path to State was made more difficult after he lost in the quarterfinals of NCS and was forced into the consolation bracket.

“I was pretty upset because I wasn’t really ready for [the quarterfinal match],” Nathan said. “I was a lot better than the guy. I thought I would be fine and that I was going to win.”

Nathan refocused to reach the third place match, where he won 6-0 to clinch the last qualifying spot for State. This was the first year in which only the top three wrestlers from NCS went to state, instead of the top four.

“What’s kind of funny is that my brother actually wrestled the older brother of the kid I wrestled to get to State,” Nathan said. “My older brother had to beat his older brother to go to State and I beat him to go to State.”
Dylan and Nathan are the only two Redwood wrestlers to reach the State meet and Nathan said that there is some added pressure from having such a successful older brother.

“When he was going through…since wrestling isn’t super strong at Redwood, no one really expected that much from him,” Nathan said. “Everyone expects more from me and they know me now because of Dylan.”

So far, Nathan has followed his brother’s path almost exactly. Like Nathan, Dylan placed third in NCS his junior year before winning it as a senior.

Senior Will Simmonds, who wrestled with both Morris brothers, attributes their accomplishments to the level of effort the two brothers put into wrestling.

“Their dedication to the sport is really admirable,” Simmonds said. “Both are very technically sound.”

Besides Nathan, Simmonds (152) was the only other Redwood wrestler to win an MCAL title, contributing to Redwood’s third place team finish.

“It was quite a rush of emotions,” Simmonds said of winning the 152-pound title. “Just really fired up and I felt like I had really accomplished my goal. I had been working for that since the beginning of sophomore year.”

Seniors Will Amos (132) and Jack Twomey (138) were runners-up in MCAL, while junior Kenneth Berreman (145) also lost in the MCAL championship match. Seven Redwood wrestlers advanced to NCS, excluding Amos, who was a late scratch due to an injury.

All but one had their seasons cut short at NCS, meaning the end of their wrestling days for some of the seniors.

“I just went out there and left it all out on the mat so I wasn’t bummed,” Simmonds said. “But it was really an eerie feeling to be done.”