San Diego Player of the Week : Briggs Glad He Listened to Advice, Kept Wrestling

SAN DIEGO —  Granite Hills’ Tim Briggs wasn’t always a good wrestler. In fact, he didn’t like the sport at first.

After losing about 60% of his matches in a youth wrestling league Briggs, then 8, started searching for other sports to play.

“My coaches used to tell me not to give up,” said Briggs, a senior wrestling in the 142-pound weight class. “And then I’d go out and lose again and say to myself, ‘Why are they doing this to me?’

“Then I beat a kid that always used to beat me and I began to think that maybe the coaches were right.”

Briggs, the Times Player of the Week, still thanks those youth league coaches for their support.

Last Saturday, at the San Diego Section Masters wrestling championship, Briggs pinned two opponents and won a 15-0 decision over another to reach the final match in his division. In the final, he pinned Poway’s Mark Fredrick in 3:45. Briggs was an easy choice as the tournament’s most valuable wrestler.

Briggs, undefeated this season with 39 wins, advances to Saturday’s state meet in San Jose. Last year he was fourth in the 132-pound division at the state meet.

“(Briggs) is a coach’s dream,” said Granite Hills Coach Pete Grisafi. “He’s very basic, nothing flashy, very coachable. He might use one or two moves on a take down, but they work against the weaker opponents all the way to the stronger ones.”

Briggs, who has been on the varsity since his freshman year, doesn’t try to dazzle an opponent.

“The basic moves are the best, they’re harder to stop,” he said. “I know the flashy moves. They are there if I need them, but the basic ones are the ones that are working.”

Briggs’ need to excel, even after wrestling for so many years, impresses his coach.

“Lots of youth wrestlers are burned out near the end of their senior year because they’ve been doing it so long,” Grisafi said. “I’m surprised to see Timmy being fired up every day of the week.

“When he walks out on the mat, he’s always ready. He’s getting himself ready seven days a week. He’s ready to go every day, every second.”

Said Briggs: “I’ve got to be up for every match. I know that the next match I have will be tougher than the one before. You always think that there is someone around the corner that is trying a little harder.

“I can’t get too overconfident. When you do that, that’s when you get picked off.”

Tim Briggs

Granite Hills High School

Weight, Class: 142, Sr.

Record: 39-0, advances to state meet Saturday. Was named most valuable wrestler at San Diego Section Masters wrestling championship last Saturday.