CHICO — Pleasant Valley High School wrestler Angelique Trueblood came to high school in hopes of playing a sport, but knowing she wanted to search for a new experience after deciding basketball was no longer in her future plans.
Trueblood sat in public safety teacher Samuel Castillo’s class her freshman year at PV, and Castillo told his class that they should try out for wrestling.
“Hey coach can girls wrestle?” Trueblood asked.
“Absolutely!” Castillo responded.
Three years later, and after battling injuries and COVID-19 both her freshman and junior year, Trueblood is competing in her first ever CIF State Championships this week in Bakersfield.
Trueblood is just the second Pleasant Valley girls wrestler to compete at the state championship meet and first since 2013. Kaitlynn Paisley became the first Vikings’ wrestler to compete at the meet in 2013 when it was held at Lemoore High School just south of Fresno.
For this reason, Trueblood is this week’s Chico Enterprise-Record Prep Athlete of the Week.
“Angelique is a great teammate. She has wonderful leadership skills and he’s really good at mentoring or newer wrestlers,” said Pleasant Valley wrestling coach Dan Nelson.
Despite going 1-and-6 in her first seven matches as a freshman, Trueblood qualified for the state championship meet her freshman year, but was forced to miss the event because of an injury. Her sophomore season she chose to not wrestle and instead focus her efforts on recovering from a shoulder injury her freshman season in an irregular season due to the pandemic.
Trueblood said she was caught off guard after her first win, despite being disappointed she had lost six matches and won just one.
“I just did that. My first tournament ever, and I won a match so that was very exciting,” Trueblood said. “I just knew that I could do it basically, and I just had to keep going because you’re not good at something right away.”
In Trueblood’s junior season, in which she wrestled at the 189-pound weight class, she was 20 wins and just 5 losses and has made it back to the state tournament. Trueblood finished third at the Northern Regional tournament and seventh at the Sac Joaquin Section tournament. She has wins over the girls who placed third and fourth at the San Joaquin Section tournament.
“It was very exciting,” Trueblood said about qualifying once again her junior season. “It was kind of like the moment where I was like, ‘you get to make the comeback this year.’ I’m not going to go out with an injury this year.”
Trueblood’s junior year has not come without any setbacks. She missed one week because of COVID-19, and just two weeks before the regional tournament — in which she qualified for the state tournament — she sprained her ankle and was away from practice for a week.
Trueblood tightly wrapped her ankle at the regional tournament and placed third despite feeling much more tired because of missed practices the two weeks prior.
“I just didn’t want to go out like that again,” Trueblood said. “I was so thankful that it wasn’t anything worse.”
Four years ago as an eighth grader Trueblood, or her family, would have never imagined her as a wrestler. She loved the game of basketball, but began learning it might not be her future because she has asthma and a hatred for running.
When Trueblood first told her mother she wanted to wrestle, her mother had the same question as she did at the start.
“Girls can wrestle? I didn’t know girls could wrestle.”
Trueblood’s father warned her of the risk of injury, to which she responded that she didn’t care and could do it. Since the start Trueblood said her parents have been her biggest supporters, noting her mother is often screaming in the background of videos in support.
Trueblood asked her mother in the car on the way to Bakersfield on Wednesday if she is still as shocked, and she said that she loves it just as much as her daughter now.
Trueblood said her goal for this year is to compete as hard as she can and give everything she has, with just one tournament left. Her senior year she is circling one tournament that she missed because of injury this season.
Trueblood’s first ever first-place award came at the Sutter tournament as a freshman, and her senior season she hopes to re-claim the award.
