Brookville Raiders win District 9 Class AA wrestling championship

Sunday, February 5, 2012

DuBOIS - They say all good things must come to an end, and that was the case Saturday at DuBois Area High School, as Brookville halted Ridgway's 5-year reign as District 9 Class AA team champions with a 36-33 victory.
Brookville, which looked better than it did in a 32-30 win at Ridgway Tuesday, won the toss and used a few lineup tweaks to get more favorable matchups this time around. The Raiders won eight of the first 10 bouts to build a commanding 36-12 lead and eventually forfeited the final two bouts after sealing their first D-9 Class AA team title since 2004.
The Raiders were making their seventh appearance in finals in the event's 14-year history and are now 4-3 in title matches. Brookville won the inaugural D-9 and PIAA Class AA team crowns in 1999, then added titles in 2001 and 2004. Saturday marked the fifth time the two schools met in the finals and the Raiders now own a 3-2 record in those matchups. Ridgway beat Brookville 32-29 for the championship last year.
Saturday's win also completed a drastic turnaround for Brookville's program and its seniors. Just two years ago when the current seniors were sophomores, Brookville was hit hard by the injury bug, among other things, and suffered through a 1-15 season. The Raiders' lone win came against Keystone (36-22), while they suffered losses to teams like Clarion (36-34), Brockway (32-21) and Curwensville (45-21). Brookville also lost twice that year to Ridgway by a combined score of 128-15.
Fast forward two years, and some of those same Raiders now stand on top of District 9 in Class AA. Led by seniors Brett Smith, Trey Constable, Logan Stout, Tyler Dombrowski, Jacob Cieleski and Brien Alexander, and a talented crop of underclassmen, Brookville has revived its program. The Raiders went 14-2 last year and are currently 17-4 heading into the state team tournament.
As for Ridgway, the Elkers (16-5) fell short in their hopes of sending long-time coach Gary Gerber out with one final team crown. Ridgway was making its 12th appearance in the finals and is now 6-6 in those contests. The only two years the Elkers didn't make the D-9 finals were 2001 and 2003.
"You never want to over look every other competition you have, but this one (D-9 team championship) has been marked on the calendar by all athletes and coaches for 365 days now, so it feels pretty good to come away with the win against a really exceptional, well-coached team," said Raiders head coach Dave Klepfer. "This is really what we wanted last year, and things didn't work out the way we had hoped. However, the kids rebounded and had a nice individual tournament, and then we had a big group of guys wrestle freestyle over the summer. That's what it takes to beat teams like Ridgway and Reynolds and those types of teams. It's hard to be a three-month a year program and beat quality teams.
"It feels great to win, especially for the seniors who have been through just about every type of season you can have. A couple years ago when these seniors were sophomores we just had the lowest season in Brookville history. But, they turned it around last year and finished 14-2 and came into this year with one goal in mind as team and that was to win this tournament. I'm really happy for seniors who have been through thick and thin and seen it all - the worst and the best - here.
"Coming into the match we knew we had an opportunity for it to be close or to really put it on them and score some points.
"We made a couple moves, and the huge thing was Constable and Zimmerman getting down in weight. That was huge getting the 18 points down there, and that makes it tough to come back on us because we have guys in our lineup who really don't get pinned. Our guys showed up and wrestled hard.
"Looking at states, the kids think we're good enough to be a Top 2 or Top 3 type of team. We've wrestled the type of schedule to prepare us to get down there. A lot of things have to go your way - stay healthy, not be sick and have kids at the right weights. We'll just have to see what happens once we get there. "
The match started at 195 and Stout got the Raiders going with a 11-0 major decision of Seth Stahl. Stout led 2-0 after one period and added three backpoints in the second.
Chad Quail then momentarily gave Ridgway the lead when he pinned Alexander in the third period at the 4:48 mark while leading 11-0. The pin gave the Elkers a 6-4 advantage, but Brookville won the next four bouts to grab a 25-6 advantage.
Jacob Cieleski started the Raiders' mini-run as he bumped up to heavyweight and beat Chris Woods, 7-1. After a scoreless first period, Cieleski grabbed a 3-0 lead in the second on an escape and takedown before Woods broke free for an escape himself. Cieleski then hit a four-point move in the final period to seal his win.
Devin Joiner followed with a forfeit win at 106, then Brookville took advantage of Constable and freshman Dalton Zimmerman making weight for 113 and 120 respectively. The pair had been wrestling at 120 and 126 prior to Saturday.
Constable used an inside cradle to pin Elker Cody Stahl in 3:17 while leading 7-0 at 113, while Zimmerman beat Tad Pierce 5-1 when he decked the Elker in 2:48 at 120.
It was the second big win of the day for Zimmerman, who beat Smethport senior Nate Schwab, 2-1, in a 36-33 win over the Hubbers in the semifinals. Schwab was a state qualifier at 112 last year and was eighth two years ago.
Corey Bush got Ridgway back on the scoreboard at 126 when he pinned Cole Clever with 1.4 seconds left in the first period, making it 25-12.
But the Raiders won three bouts in a row.
Freshman Jimmy Miller quickly grabbed the momentum back for the Raiders with an 8-4 win at 132 over Zac McKnight.
Brock Zacherl followed with a 16-1 technical fall over Dakota Dahler in 5:34 at 138, while twin brother Brodie Zacherl scored a big win at 145, beating Steve Mitchell 5-3 to avenge an 8-7 setback to the Elker Tuesday.
Zacherl led Mitchell 2-0 after the first period, but Mitchell evened the score with a reversal in the second. Zacherl escaped before the end of the period to lead 3-2, then scored a reversal from the bottom in the third to go up 5-2.
Mitchell eventually earned an escape, but the Raider held Mitchell's last second attempts to tie the match.
Down 24 with four bouts to go, Ridgway needed falls in the final four bouts to tie things up, and Slade Horner pulled out an exciting pin at 152 to make that a possibility.
Horner and Raider Zach Vroman entered the third period of their bout scoreless. Horner started down in the final period and escaped to take a 1-0 lead. It appeared Horner might win by that margin.
However, Vroman took down the Elker with just over 10 seconds left, only to see Horner escape right away to even the score at 2-2 to force overtime.
In the extra session, Horner took Vroman down to his back and secured the fall just a few tenths of a second before the buzzer sounded.
It was Horner's second win over Vroman this week. Both are reigning D-9 champs.
Ridgway's Kyle Caggiano followed with a 6-1 win over Taylor Cudworth at 160, but the regular decision sealed the overall win for the Raiders.
With the match decided, Brookville forfeited to Elkers Dalton Sheasley and Jake Himes to end the match and set the final at 36-33.
"They (Raiders) weighed in like they had to," Gerber said. "We had a forfeit at bottom at they took advantage of it. They also moved guys down and went for big sweep down low, which was exactly what they had to do.
"We also lost the coin toss, which didn't give us our choices very much, but we have a big hole in our lineup and you can't be doing that, especially against a quality opponent like Brookville.
"It would have been nice to go out with a sixth straight title, but Brookville earned it today. I do feel bad for our seniors. They never lost a district championship here, and this was their first one. The seniors wrestled really hard for us, and I was pleased with the effort from them. They are a great group of kids and should be proud of their accomplishments."
Brookville reached the finals with a 36-33 semifinal win over Smethport.
The Raiders won seven of the first 10 bouts to build an insurmountable 36-9 lead, then forfeited the final four weights (145-170) to save some wear-and-tear on its wrestlers prior to the finals.
Brookville advances to the state duals, where it opens Thursday at 4 p.m. against either the District 1 or District 12 champ.
Ridgway travels to Smethport Wednesday.

Reported by Chris Wechtenhiser, assistant sports editor. Email:chrisw@thecourierexpress.com