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Basile's Isaac Cortez capped is perfect 23-0 record with his third Division III state championship via a 1:43 fall over Joseph Belcher of St. Louis	Cortez was chosen the Division III Outstanding Wrestler

Photo
Place	1	2	3	4	5	6
Name	Isaac Cortez	Joseph Belcher	Trace Morrow	Kaden Dean	Cameran Mire	Collin Hebert
School	Basile	St. Louis	Summerfield	Evangel	Kaplan	St. Michael
Seed	1	6	2		7	NS
Final Record	23-0	14-7	37-17	13-9	15-7	10-19
Grade	Senior	Senior	Junior	Senior	Junior	Junior

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Synopsis

What does "getting a few matches under [one's] belt" really mean?  Nothing if you are Basile's Isaac Cortez.  The senior's first match was on December 20th, 2019, at Brother Martin's Trey Culotta Invitational.  His first championship was also at the Trey Culotta (successfully defending his title from 2018.  Two weeks after that Cortez won the Brusly Invitational, then the Rayne Invitational and the Ken Cole Memorial prior to the state championships.  And he won there - easily.  So easily, in fact, that he was awarded the Division III Outstanding Wrestler award.  In only two matches was Cortez forced to use the full six minutes.  One was a 9-1 major decision against Comeaux's Morgan Burke in the last pool round of the Trey Culotta.  The other was a 13-5 major decision over the defending and soon to be repeating Division II state champion, Teurlings Catholic's David Bernard.  Once the editor joked about Cortez bringing his "D-" game if he did not bring his "A-" game.  This season Cortez only had an "A+" game.  He pinned his first three opponents in a total time of 2:44 to advance to his third consecutive Division III title match.

St. Louis' Joseph Belcher was seeded sixth, but after his round-one pin in 2:42 he decided some upsets were due.  He pinned third-seeded Aaron Couty of Brusly in 4:40 and in the semifinals he eked past second-seeded Trace Morrow of Summerville 6-5.  Belcher had never been in a state finals match before and, against Cortez, what did he have to lose?

Early Rounds, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Early Consolation Rounds

Consolation Finals

Finals

(1) Isaac Cortez of Basile pinned (6) Joseph Belcher of St. Louis in 1:43.

Video

Apathy and avarice on the part of two entities have prevented completing a comprehensive pictorial article on the 2020 Louisiana state wrestling championships.

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