Though it may be hard to imagine the way he competes on the football field and wrestling mat these days, Bradley Gutierrez hasn’t always been in the greatest physical shape.
Gutierrez never really was an athlete until he set foot in Columbus North High School 3½ years ago. Now, the senior is a two-time semistate wrestling qualifier with hopes of making it to the sport’s biggest stage.
“Honestly, I was tired of getting picked on in school,” Gutierrez said. “So I just decided I wanted to be athletic and have an athletic body, I guess. I thought it would maybe be good to go exercise or something.”
Before high school, the extent of Gutierrez’s athletic endeavors consisted of playing soccer as a first- and second-grader in Sacramento, California, where he grew up. He moved to Columbus with his family when he was 10, but didn’t return to athletics for another four years.
[sc:text-divider text-divider-title=”Story continues below gallery” ]
“Most of my life, I was isolated from sports,” Gutierrez said. “The only thing I really knew about was soccer.”
That was before arriving at North.
“I heard about the football program, and I wanted to try it out,” Gutierrez said. “It was just working out and conditioning. Then, I heard about wrestling, and I wanted to try it out, too, and had more conditioning, more lifting and just kept going.”
Gutierrez played varsity football as a junior and became a starting defensive tackle as a senior. He’s had even more success in wrestling, making it to the Evansville Semistate as a junior last year.
Saturday, he’ll be back in the semistate at the Ford Center, competing at 285 pounds, otherwise known as the heavyweight division.
“He’s a physical kid,” first-year North coach Matt Joyce said. “He puts a lot of time in the weight room, and it really shows on the mat because he just has a raw power about him and a quickness that 220s and heavyweights have a tough time keeping up with.”
Gutierrez describes his former self as being a lot bigger, but with a body that isn’t as mature as it is now. He weighed in the 220s, but was without a lot of muscle. He has since lost most of his baby fat.
“I’ve had a lot of help from my team and my coaches to get better and better each day,” he said.
These days, Gutierrez usually weighs in the 240s, so he sometimes gives up some pounds to those in the heaviest weight class. But Joyce said he makes up for it with his strength and quickness.
“He has a pretty big motor,” Joyce said. “It takes a little while for him to get tired. He wears everybody down and then kind of has his way with them.”
Gutierrez is considering continuing his wrestling career in college. He has been talking to coaches at Adrian (Michigan) and is planning to schedule a visit there. He says he has a lot of letters that he has yet to open.
Colleges’ interest in Gutierrez could spike if he has a big showing on Saturday and makes it to next weekend’s state finals at Bankers Life Fieldhouse in Indianapolis. The top four in each weight class advance from semistate to state.
Gutierrez (19-6) has a first-round semistate matchup against 20th-ranked Southridge senior Wyatt Kramer (33-4). With a win, Gutierrez would face Heritage Hills senior Aidian Rea (35-8) or 16th-ranked Mooresville junior Robbie Gentry (27-5) in the quarterfinals, known as the “ticket round.”
“It would be a dream come true to make it to state,” Gutierrez said. “It was my first goal to make it back to semistate, so then I could carry on to try and make it to state.”
Gutierrez and 113-pound teammate Morgan Smith will try to give North state qualifiers for the second year in a row. Brigham Kleinhenz, who is now an assistant coach for the Bull Dogs, made it last year.
Like Kleinhenz, Gutierrez enters the semistate following a third-place finish in the Jeffersonville Regional.
“I think he’s set himself up in a pretty good spot, especially getting third (at regional),” Joyce said. “Brigham got third (at regional) last year, and he made it through. So hopefully, he’ll be able to win those first two matches.”
[sc:pullout-title pullout-title=”If you go” ][sc:pullout-text-begin]
Evansville Reitz Semistate
When: 10 a.m. EST/9 a.m. CST Saturday
Where: Ford Center, Evansville
Admission: $8 (final session only) or $10 (all day)
Advancement: Top four in each weight class qualify for state
Local competitors
Columbus East: Noah Lykins (106), Kenton Wilson (113), Nate John (120), Jeremy Clark (126), Joey Gordon (132), Cayden Rooks (138), Kade Law (145), Jake Schoenegge (152), Sam Morrill (160), Nick South (170), Noah White (182), Jacob Bolte (220)
Columbus North: Morgan Smith (113), Bradley Gutierrez (285)
Brown County: Branden Leslie (113), David Tucker (126), Bryce Denton (132)
Jennings County: Sam Bennett (170), Cameron Woodard (182), Logan Askew (195)
[sc:pullout-text-end]
