HS Wrestling: Local grapplers gear up for regionals
Blue Mountain's Owen Woll, left, works to escape from Bethlehem Freedom's Ivan Bonilla during their 152-pound third-place bout Feb. 22 at the District 11 Class 3A Wrestling Championships at Bethlehem Liberty High School. (Photo by Bob Lipsky
News, notes and observations as we await the first whistle Friday at the Class 3A Northeast and Class AA Southeast Regional Wrestling Championships …
Regional rundown
Here are the schedules for the two regionals involving local wrestlers:
CLASS AA
Southeast Regional Wrestling Championships
Districts entered: 1, 3, 11, 12
When/Where: Feb. 28 and March 1 at Freedom High School, Bethlehem
Schedule: Friday — Round of 16 at 4:30 p.m., championship quarterfinals at 6:45 p.m., first-round consolations at 8:45 p.m. Saturday — Second-round consolations at 9:30 a.m., championship semifinals and third-round consolations at 11 a.m., fourth-round consolations including seventh-place matches at 12:30 p.m., championship finals, third- and fifth-place bouts (3 mats) at 4 p.m.
Advancement: The top five placewinners in each weight class will qualify for the PIAA Wrestling Championships on March 6-8 at the Giant Center in Hershey.
CLASS 3A
Northeast Regional Wrestling Championships
Districts entered: 2, 4, 11, 12
When/Where: Feb. 28 and March 1 at Liberty High School, Bethlehem
Schedule: Friday — Round of 16 at 5 p.m., championship quarterfinals at 6:45 p.m., first-round consolations at 7:45 p.m. Saturday — Second-round consolations at 9:30 a.m., championship semifinals and third-round consolations at 11 a.m., fourth-round consolations at 12:30 p.m., championship finals, third- and fifth-place bouts (3 mats) at 4 p.m.
Advancement: The top five placewinners in each weight class will qualify for the PIAA Wrestling Championships on March 6-8 at the Giant Center in Hershey.
Spartan pride
North Schuylkill qualified a Schuylkill League-best five wrestlers for the Southeast Regional.
Included in that group is District 11 Class AA 215-pound champion Cadyn McGraw. The junior became the Spartans’ 49th district champion (including those who won more than one) and the school’s first since Brady Mickatavage captured the 195-pound title in 2017.
Also at districts, senior Nate Sterner became North Schuylkill’s 25th wrestler to join the 100-win club. After falling to eventual champion Luca Albanese of Pen Argyl in the quarterfinals, Sterner stormed back with four straight victories — all by fall — to take third place. He improved to 31-8 on the season and 102-49 for his career. Kaden Casey made it last year for the Spartans and finished his career with 112 victories.
Sterner became the fifth Schuylkill League wrestler this season to reach 100 career victories, joining Blue Mountain’s Owen Woll and Bradley Renninger, Tamaqua’s Aiden Schlier and Pine Grove’s Austin Martin.
Getting close
A few other Schuylkill Leaguers are approaching the 100-win mark.
Pottsville junior Terrell McFarland (35-6 season, 96-14 career) is closest as he heads into the Class 3A Northeast Regional.
Mahanoy Area junior Kyler Quick (30-11 season, 90-40 career) and Tamaqua senior Jacob Hehn (93-61) have reached 90 wins as well.
Youth movement
Of the 26 boys who qualified for regionals, just seven are seniors. The rest of the breakdown: eight juniors, 10 sophomores and one freshman.
This bodes well for the future — especially if more wrestlers dedicate themselves to offseason wrestling and weightlifting.
Viking quest
After suffering through a winless dual-meet season, Williams Valley is enjoying success in the individual postseason.
Four Vikings — two juniors and two sophomores — earned trips to regionals. Junors Xzavion Tennis and Camron Green took thirds, while sophomores Magnus Monger and Colin Crisswell placed fourth.
Here’s hoping more athletes — are you listening football and soccer players? — get involved so that Williams Valley can have some dual-meet success too. The skills translate across sports, including body control, explosive movements, balance, core and overall strength, tackling, mental toughness, one-on-one competitiveness and more. Every season spent working in the wrestling room will take your athleticism to another level in your other chosen sport. Guaranteed.
It’s a fact. Why else do NFL scouts, coaches and general managers gravitate to multi-sport athletes, particularly wrestlers?
Change needed
Districts 1 and 12 have six Class AA teams apiece, compared to 20 in District 11 and 30 in District 3. The result: While District 11 and 3 wrestlers had to win multiple matches to qualify for regionals, athletes in Districts 1 and 12 often needed to win one bout or even just show up to place second and qualify. Nationally ranked Faith Christian and state power Conwell-Egan are excellent programs, and their wrestlers would have the opportunity to get through to regionals at similar levels as they do now.
Here’s what I mean: In District 1 (3 regional qualifiers), two weights had just three wrestlers, meaning everybody in the bracket advanced to regionals. It’s worse in District 12 (2 regional qualifiers after declining third-place spot). Five weights had just two wrestlers and five more had just three.
That’s inherently unfair to District 11 (4 qualifiers) and District 3 (6 qualifiers), even though District 12’s third-place spot was divided among District 11’s No. 5s and District 3’s No. 7s based on higher rating points.
That’s a lot of inside baseball, but here’s a simple, equitable solution that would retain district championships and even the playing field for regionals.
First, let Districts 1 and 12 have their district meets as usual, but hold them on the sectional weekend (this year Feb. 15 instead of Feb. 22). Then, on district weekend, take the top three from each district and hold a subregional in which the top four wrestlers qualify for regionals. Meanwhile, District 11 would get five qualifiers and District 3 would get seven, more in line with the number of teams in their respective districts. Four, plus five, plus seven gives you a 16-man bracket for regionals.
It makes sense to me, common sense. That means it probably won’t happen.
Girls’ update
We’d be remiss if we didn’t take a few minutes and talk about the excellence the area’s girls’ are producing this postseason.
While Pine Grove and Panther Valley excelled last Sunday at the Southeast Regional (more on them in a moment), one local wrestler will compete in the Southcentral Regional Girls’ Wrestling Championships on Saturday at Penn Manor High School.
Maggie Hoffman-Long, a Tri-Valley junior who competes in a co-op with Upper Dauphin, is in the 12-girl 136-pound bracket. Hoffman-Long (19-11) earned her spot by placing fourth in a sectional tournament on Feb. 14. Hoffman-Long opens against J.P. McCaskey’s Kaleia Timmko (26-3). The top four placewinners in each weight class will qualify for states.
Three Schuylkill Leaguers have already punched their tickets to Hershey.
