2022 LHSAA State Wrestling Championships February 11th-12th 2022 Raising Cane's River Center Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Place	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th
Podium
Name	Christian Bergeron	Jason Krail	Carlos Flores	Allen Young	Aden LaBorde	Ryan Monier
School	Basile	De la Salle	Thomas Jefferson	Brusly	John Curtis	Hannan
Seed	1	2	3	4	7	NS
Class	11	11	12	11	11	9
Final Record*	14-3	36-11	24-5	12-12	12-13	15-16

*    Records include all wins but only losses to Louisiana wrestlers.  Forfeits and defaults are not counted.

Junior Christian Bergeron took his 4-0 record at 182 lbs. into the state tournament, added three more wins, and became Basile's third state champion of the evening.  Bergeron was very tough at 195 lbs. and 220 lbs. before January 11th, having only lost to a Division I state champion, a Division II runner-up and a Division III third-place winner.

Seeding Synopsis

In 2021 De la Salle’s Jason Krail placed 5^th at 152 lbs. and Basile’s Christian Bergeron placed fourth at 182 lbs.  In the 2021-22 season Krail stayed at 182 lbs. while Bergeron competed at 195 lbs. for the vast majority of the season.  The two did not have any head-to-head matches or relevant common opponents.  They did not compete in the same weight class at any tournaments, nor did they at the 2021 state championships.  Seeding went to the sixth criteria, which was the higher placement in the 2021 event.  Hence, the top-seed went to Bergeron.  It did not really matter as each wrestler breezed into the finals.

Basile junior Christian Bergeron had a perfect record at 182 lbs.  It was only 4-0, though, with a Rayne Invitational championship to his credit.  He was 7-3 at 195 lbs., but he started the season rather late, on December 11^th, probably due to the Bearcats making it to the state Class 1A football quarterfinals on November 26^th.  His losses came to Eric Levert of Teurlings Catholic (D2 2nd), Sulphur's Corey Hyatt (D1 1st x 2) in the Jacob McMillan finals and to Wade Rist of Hannan (D3 4th) n the finals of the Brusly Invitational.  As for the other Division III 182 lbs. seeds, he only met, and defeated, #4 Allen Young of Brusly and #5 Graham Conrad of St. Louis.  He defeated Rayne's 2021 runner-up Garrett Louviere, Sean Dorset (D2 4th), also of Rayne, and Roger Holmes of St. Michael (D3 3rd). 

De la Salle junior Jason Krail was 34-10 entering the state championships, which included championships at the Bulldog Brawl, the Trygg Memorial and the Brusly Invitational.  At Brusly he defeated #3 Carlos Flores of Thomas Jefferson, the #4 seed, Allen Young of Brusly (D3 4th) and Christian Johnson of Bossier (D3 1st).  He placed fourth at the Trey Culotta in which East Ascension’s Corey Holmes was the only Louisiana wrestler to which he lost.  During the season Krail defeated the likes of Shaw's Jason Brown (D2 3rd), Joshua Eames of John Curtis (D3 3rd), Corey Holmes of East Ascension (D1 3rd), Bossier's Christian Johnson (D3 1st) and St. Paul's Jackson Peak.

Of the remaining top-four seeds, Flores, the only senior in the top-six 182 lbs. placers, won the Billy Duplessis Invitational, placed second at the Trygg Memorial and third at the Bulldog Brawl, the Brusly Invitational and the Titan Invitational.  The junior Young had fourth-place finishes at the Brusly and Rayne invitationals and placed sixth at the Greater Baton Rouge Championships.

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Quarterfinals

Everybody received the memo on what seeds were supposed to win quarterfinal matches.

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Semifinals

Aside from Young making Bergeron go the full-six, and Flores lasting twice as long as his first meeting versus Krail, the semifinals went as expected.

(1) Christian Bergeron (BAS) defeated (4) Allen Young (BRU) 12-0 MD

(2) Jason Krail (DLS) pinned (3) Carlos Flores (TJ) in 3:02

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Championship Consolation Rounds

Thomas Jefferson senior Carlos Flores was remarkably consistent against Young in the match for third.  In the Brusly Invitational third-place match the Panther senior pinned the Panther junior in 1:18.  This time, Flores recorded a fall over Brusly's Young in 1:15.

Hannan freshman Ryan Monier may not have expected to be on the podium at the end of the tournament, but he did all that was needed to be there.  And he gave seventh-seeded John Curtis junior Aden Laborde a full five minutes in a match LaBorde won 8-2.

(3) Carlos Flores (TJ) pinned (4) Allen Young (BRU) in 1:15  to place 3rd

(7) Aden LaBorde (JC) defeated Ryan Monier (HAN) 8-2 to place 5th

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Finals

Oddly, neither wrestler scored a point in the first period.  It is odd because in the second period Bergeron escaped in 13 seconds and 28 seconds later he had scored a takedown and recorded a fall to win the match.  Bergeron moved from fourth in 2021 to first in 2022.  Krail moved from fifth to second over that time period.  Both should be favorites to win titles in 2023.

(1) Christian Bergeron (BAS) pinned (2) Jason Krail (DLS) in 2:41

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