DENVER – The Pueblo East High School boys wrestling team had business to take care of this weekend at the Class 4A state tournament – and business was done.
The Eagles placed nine wrestlers to win their fourth Class 4A state championship in the last five years and second in a row at Ball Arena.
East finished atop the standings with 158.5 points to muscle past second-place Roosevelt, which had 141 points.
“Our thing is we build wrestlers in the room,” third-year East mat boss Tyler Lundquist said. “We don’t count on the guys that just naturally have it. Our job in the room as coaches, and teammates, is to build wrestlers because we know how state championships are won. They are not won by three or four guys. They are won by seven, eight, 10, 12 whatever that might be.
'It takes those guys who want to wrestle and take third, take fifth, that’s how you win state championships and that’s the culture around here.”
Uriah Duran (113 pounds), Elijah Contreras (190), Justus Freeman (157) and Michael McCullough (215) fueled the Eagles as they all claimed runner-up finishes.
The state placers for East were one off its school record of 10 in 2025.
This year, Noah Sanchez (106 pounds, fourth), Jason Soto (120 pounds, fifth), Michael Banuelos (138 pounds, sixth), Giovanni Sanchez (144 pounds, fourth), and Logan Trujillo (165 pounds, sixth) all scored points for the Eagles to help them win state again.
IT is East’s fifth state wrestling championship in school history. The Eagles also won state in 2019, 2022, and 2023 and 2025. Coach Pat Laughlin guided East to its first three state titles. In 2024, East finished second in the 4A team race to Mead.
“I’m very proud of what we accomplished this year and I’m already thinking about next year,” Lundquist said. “Like how I am going to piece these guys together because we put in the work for this year and we cashed in. We will find out what happens next year, but I feel good about that as well. We have a core group coming back and we have some guys who people have never heard of that are underneath studs and those guys are getting out of the way and we will see if we can keep it rolling.”
Freeman, a senior, lost a tough 4-1 overtime decision to Air Academy’s David Burchett Jr., who had a three-point takedown as the first overtime period expired to get the win. Freeman had a 2-2 record against Burchett Jr. this season beating him 5-2 last week in regionals. Burchett earned is second consecutive state title.
“He was more offensive than I was and he got in better positions than I was at times,” Freeman said. “It is tough losing this match, especially since we just wrestled last week.”
Individually in 4A, Severance’s Drake VomBaur shined bright again winning his third state title, putting him in line to become a four-time state champion next year.
VomBaur muscled past Air Academy’s Dylan Saba 7-1 in the 120-pound finals.
After the first period, neither wrestler scored, but VomBaur began to take control in the second period. He had an early escape and a late takedown to go into the third period up 4-0.
He then used a reversal with 32 seconds remaining in the match to seal the victory.
“This one meant a lot more to me because I got injured right before (state),” VomBaur said. “I injured my (left quad), and I couldn’t train for a few days and then before that my lower back got injured and then I got sick. I didn’t have a lot of energy, but I was able to overcome all that. I’m just grateful that I was healthy enough to get through this tournament.”
Besides VonBaur and Burchett, Windsor 175-pounder Robert Kendall became a multiple champion, winning his second title. Zach Benson, the 144-pound champion from Gunnison, finished the season undefeated.