P.J. Ponce was inducted into the San Manuel High School Hall of Fame in 2014, an overdue honor for winning back-to-back wrestling state championships in 1987 and 1988. He was later a two-time NAIA All-American in North Dakota, and helped coach San Manuel to a state title in 2002.
Last Saturday, he coached Mountain View to the Division II title, first in school history. Ponce earlier coached Empire High’s wrestling team for seven years.
Mountain View produced two state champs, 120-pound Jayce Cunha, who was 32-4; and 132-pound Marcus Castillo, who finished the season 42-2. Ponce’s team lost to top-seed Queen Creek by 32 points earlier in the year, but outscored them by 6 ½ points in the state finals.
If Sunnyside’s three-time state wrestling champion Roman Bravo-Young can win it again in 2018, he will join an exclusive class of Tucson wrestlers as four-time state champs. Seven have done so; Salpointe’s Nick Frost was the first in 1996-99. Frost won 98 consecutive matches; Bravo-Young is now 140-0 in his Blue Devils career.
