the Daily Flypaper
from the desk of
Brick Bronson
“Penn Cambria wins their own Tourney”
2008 Sheetz Holiday Classic Results:
Team Race:
Penn Cambria was led by their lightweights and was able to capture the team title outlasting Chestnut Ridge. PC lead the tournament from the start and never looked back, capturing three individual championships: Link, Szala, & Myers. I had a chance to interview PC assistant coach Justin Merriweather and he stated “We are proud of Nick Szala for first beating Myers (Wendell) from Altoona and then beating the senior from Chestnut Ridge (Brandon Berkey)” “I am also very pumped about my heavyweights, guys like Kushie really stepped up and used what I taught them”. “We are going to celebrate this win, but move forward on Monday”
The overall tournament seemed down from years in the past, but Grove City and St Mary’s brought solid wrestling to the field. Grove City advanced several wrestlers into the finals, but could only come up with fourth place overall. Hopefully one day this tournament could be upgraded to a bigger gym like Saint Francis and many more teams could be invited. This would make for a much better and more competitive tournament. Then they wont have to sell the programs for $3.00! Overall this is a well ran tournament and hopefully one day will expand.
1. Penn Cambria
2. Chestnut Ridge
3. St Mary’s
4. Grove City
5. Altoona
6. Richland
7. Portage
8. Central Cambria
9. Hyndman
Final Matches:
103: Evan Link (PC) dominated the entire match and was able to win by TF over Roberts from Jamestown.
112: Freshmen Nick Szala was about to knock off Wendell Myers in the semifinals and senior Brandon Berkey in the finals to earn his first championship.
119: Grove City got rolling with Johnny Pas knocking off Jacob Hines in the finals. Pas used his senior experience to beat up on the youngsters.
125: Patrick Myers looked very impressive winning the 125 championship beating Brady Fyffe in the finals.
130: Hyndman’s Pride got fired up, as Levi Hosselrode beat Zach Carpinello for the title.
135: Hyndman continued to roll as Logan Sheldon beat Steinberg from CC 5-3, which was the same result when these two squared off last year at Hershey. I think this may have been the toughest class of the tournament.
140: United’s Robert Henderson dominated this class by recording falls throughout. Henderson looked extremely tough and should have an outstanding year.
145: Crestwood Jake O’Hara pinned Dave McCloskey from Altoona in the finals. O’Hara looked tough all tournament.
152: This was the best match of the finals by far! Bishop Carrol’s Shawn Perich beat Chad Miller 2-1 in OT, which was the most exciting 1-1 matches I have ever watched. There were many great scrambles and both wrestlers had chances to win, but Perich ended the match by riding Miller in the third OT.
160: Shane Claar from St Mary’s beat John Julian (Double J) from PC in a close one.
171: Caleb Kolb looked extremely good crushing everyone including Brennon Corle in the finals. Kolb pinned his way trough the tournament and earned the most pins in the least amount of time.
189: KJ Walters upset Joe Shook from BC in the semifinals, but couldn’t outlast Nick Miller from Grove City.
215: Sean Sadosky from St Mary’s looked really tough by beating Josh McDannel in the finals. Sandosky earned the tournaments most outstanding wrestler award with his victory over McAnimal from Chestnut Ridge.
285: In the 15th OT, Eric Minegard from Laurel Highlands decides to tilt Tyler miller from Grove City to earn a 6-4 decision. Kevin Stager from Portage earned the fastest fall award with a 7 second pin, which could have been called in 5.
Special Awards:
Toughest Class: 135
Most Dominating Wrestler: Robert Henderson & Caleb Kolb
Best Match: Perich vs Miller
Best Mustache : Steinberg & Hosselrode tie
Best coach of the Tournament: Todd Niebaur & Justin Merriweather (team champions)
Freshmen Studs:
One fad that stuck out in this tournament was the abundance of superior young wrestlers. There were many that wrestled well, which should make for many good PC tournaments to come. Nick Szala beat Myers (AAA District Placer) and then beat Berkey. In the 152 class, Wesley Phipps looked extremely tough and almost pulled over an upset win over Chad Miller. He is a monster already and will have a stellar career. And finally John Rizzo from Richland gave McDannel everything he wanted in the semifinals and possibly should have
had a take down, which got called early out of bounds. Rizzo ended up pinning 4 wrestlers to claim 3rd at 215. Other freshmen that looked extremely tough: Benji Rager 119, Joey Stoy 119, Tony Risilitti 125.
~Brick Bronson~