The Lancers senior took first place Saturday in the 136-pound A bracket of the Lloyd C. Engel Wrestling Tournament at Escalon High School.

The tournament is a two-day affair with the first day being pool competition and the second day’s seeding being determined by the pool success. Salcido was highly successful on Friday with four pins in four bouts.

He started Saturday with a pin of Nolan Mair of Oak Ridge followed by a narrow 6-5 decision over Escalon’s Christian Cruz, currently state-ranked with an honorable mention by “The California Wrestler.” He then defeated Alex Prostock of Inderkum for first place with a 12-4 major decision.

“Nico is wrestling great this year,” East Union coach A.J. Riendel said. “He has had some bad luck with seeding at tournaments because he didn’t finish last year as well as he would have liked to. He seems very determined to finish better this year better.

“He only has two losses on the season, both to state-ranked wrestlers at No. 6 and No. 17. We have some things to work on, and because he is very coachable there is no doubt in my mind that he will get better and finish the season strong.”

It does not get any easier for Salcido; he and the rest of the Lancers compete in the Valley Oak League team round-robin meet at Central Catholic with Oakdale and Kimball. Then the Lancers travel to Sacramento on Friday for the two-day Tim Brown Memorial Wrestling Tournament at the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium.