Gutierrez-Tyler Is First Hampton Bays Wrestler in Nearly 20 Years To Earn All-State Honors

Prior to his junior year, Cyrus Gutierrez-Tyler had never stepped on a wrestling mat for Hampton Bays. In just two years, the Hampton Bays senior has become an All-State wrestler.

Gutierrez-Tyler placed eighth at the New York State Division II Championships held at MVP Arena in Albany on Friday and Saturday. He is the first Hampton Bays wrestler to earn All-State honors since Dominick Mutascio placed sixth in 2006.

“It was definitely great to see him progress this far,” Hampton Bays head coach Mike Lloyd said of Gutierrez-Tyler. “When he came to us, he had never really wrestled before, so his junior year was his first year, this being his second year with the team. He definitely advanced in his skill and abilities very quickly. It’s a shame we didn’t have him sooner, but he’s been able to do a lot in a very short period of time.”

Gutierrez-Tyler was seeded sixth in the 145-pound weight class, which is pretty high, at least historically, for Suffolk County Division II wrestlers who don’t have a long history of competing at states; this was Gutierrez-Tyler’s debut at the state tournament. To that end, Lloyd said there was history and background that went into it, but is somewhat necessary in understanding how Gutierrez-Tyler accomplished what he did.

Gutierrez-Tyler defeated Elwood-John Glenn junior Peter Bell for the county championship last month. Bell, albeit in some controversy, defeated Luke Nieto of Plainedge, a reigning state champion who went on to win another state title this year, but at 152 pounds. Nonetheless, since Gutierrez-Tyler defeated Bell, who defeated Nieto, that secured some big points for him that essentially netted him a first-round bye.

Gutierrez-Tyler turned that into an 8-5 victory over Asaac Mead (Section IV-Deposit-Hancock). He then lost to Ayden Buttery (Section VI-Newfane) in the quarterfinals, leading to Gutierrez-Tyler’s best match of the tournament in the “blood round” of the consolation bracket. There he faced Nathan Barber (Section II-Granville/Whitehall) and scored on a takedown early to take a lead, but Barber responded with an escape and a takedown halfway through the second period. With about a minute left in the third, Gutierrez-Tyler, trailing 9-7, took Barber down again in the last 15 seconds of the match, winning it 10-9 and guaranteeing him a top-eight placement and All-State honors.

Gutierrez-Tyler did lose his next two matches to Ethan Badillo (Section I-Nanuet) and Cyler Baer (Section X-Gouverneur), respectively, the latter of which being the match for seventh and eighth place. But all of Gutierrez-Tyler’s losses were to opponents who eventually placed — Buttery finished fourth, Badillo fifth and Baer seventh.

Gutierrez-Tyler said it was “really exciting” to be the first All-State wrestler from Hampton Bays in nearly 20 years.

“I really didn’t have any expectations coming in since this was my first time being up here,” he said. “But I am very happy I medaled and got All-State. It is a great accomplishment, and I was just really happy to have the opportunity to be out on that mat.”

Gutierrez-Tyler did add that he thought he could have done better than he did.

“I had a pretty bad day the second day,” he said. “I won my first match and that felt really good. I wrestled this guy with a tattoo. I had never wrestled a guy with a tattoo, but I stuck in there, and at the end of the day, it’s just wrestling.

“But, honestly, losing that first match on Friday brought down my ego a bit,” Gutierrez-Tyler added. “That ended up being my last match of the day and I was sad after that. But the next day I had a mental reset.”

After defeating Barber to get into the placement rounds, Gutierrez-Tyler said he chugged some Gatorade between matches and that was the worst decision he made all weekend. He said he could feel the Gatorade slug around in his stomach to the point where he nearly got sick.

“I couldn’t wrestle the same after that,” he said. “If I could change one thing all weekend, that would be it. Besides that, the guys I faced were very good.”

Lloyd could tell that Gutierrez-Tyler was nervous going into the placement rounds and said he tried his best to calm him down.

“I reminded him going into that last match that it’s a matter of getting this experience and it’s not something he could take for granted. And that regardless of what happened, he is the first person that has gotten this far in 19 years,” he said. “And that we were proud of him either way.”

Gutierrez-Tyler said he’s going to take some time off to recover before training again for the 36th annual National High School Association’s Nationals, which are March 28-30 at the Virginia Beach Sports Center. In terms of his future beyond that in the sport of wrestling, Gutierrez-Tyler said that he’d really like to continue it in college, but choosing exactly where that might be is something he has to still decide. There were coaches from Rhode Island who came to watch him compete last weekend, and so that’s a possible destination. But he’s keeping his options open in the meantime.