For years, the six schools which sponsored wrestling programs in Blair County-Tyrone, Bellwood-Antis, Altoona, Claysburg-Kimmel, Central and Hollidaysburg met for a county tournament early in the new year. With most of the schools suffering from depleted lineups, often a wrestler would get only one or two matches, hardly worth the effort.
Huntingdon County also ran a tournament for the four schools, Huntingdon, Juniata Valley, Southern Huntingdon and Mount Union also did the same again with nobody getting many matches.
Finally, beginning with 2003-04 wrestling season, the two counties got together and began a tournament with the 10 teams divided into two pools of schools and then finals with all wrestlers getting at least four or five matches.
Some things change over time, but some hold on forever, or so it seems.
The 2006 Zeigler Chevrolet Tournament was held on Saturday, Jan. 7, 2006, at the Altoona Fieldhouse and for the third straight year Tyrone Area High School rode home with the team title and lots of other individual medals as well.
The Golden Eagles claimed a pair of individual champions in Robert Waite (119) and Justin Schopp (160) and also had Cody Weaver (103) and T. J. Albright (112) in the finals, but both finished second.
“Overall, I’m very, very pleased with the way the kids responded,” said Tyrone coach Blair Packer. “I thought we had some great, great wrestling. We knew it would be between us, Hollidaysburg and Southern Huntingdon. I can’t say enough about the way the team performed today.”
Hollidaysburg challenged Tyrone for the title and outdid the Eagles in champions three to two, but the Orange and Black countered with the two seconds, four thirds and two fourths to place 10 wrestlers in the top four respectively.
Bellwood-Antis placed eighth in the team race with three third place finishers and two fifths.
Waite (16-3) breezed through his first two matches, pinning Tim Collier of Bellwood-Antis, in 3:34, and Matt Hoffman of Southern Huntingdon, in 1:40, majored Mount Union’s Devon Smith 15-6 and then used an escape and two takedowns to tough out a 5-2 win over Pete Mykut of Huntingdon to reach the finals. In the championship final, Waite quickly took down Central’s Brad Ritchey, switched to a headlock and pinned his opponent in 1:35.
At 160, Schopp, one of the tournament surprises, coming into the tourney just 6-5, won four straight matches to earn his first-place medal. Justin (10-5) pinned Matt Caputo of Hollidaysburg, in 4:41, and decisioned Eric Hoffmaster of Mount Union 8-1 and Altoona’s Zac Bender 8-3. In the finals, Schopp and Southern Huntingdon’s Tyler Mansberger were locked in a scoreless deadlock for the first two periods. Schopp picked the bottom position to begin the third stanza, worked a reversal and followed with two back points to win a 4-0 shutout for the championship.
Cody Weaver (10-4) pinned Jeremiah Feathers of Central, in just 0:55 to begin the tournament, then beat Steffan Housum of Hollidaysburg, 6-2 and Jess Runk of Huntingdon, 8-1. In the finals in a rematch against Housum, Weaver yielded a first-period takedown, and was then able to escape in the second period, but couldn’t get any further score to drop a tough 2-1 decision.
Albright (9-1) pinned his way into the finals, decking Mark Smeyers of Huntingdon, in 1:31, Cameron Mease of Mount Union, in 2:23, and Kenny Moyer of Hollidaysburg, in 0:39. In the finals at 112, against PIAA qualifier Cody Myers of Southern Huntingdon, Albright scored first notching a first-period takedown, but Myers shut T. J. down after that, while scoring a second-period takedown of his own and adding a reversal in the third for a 4-2 win.
Sam McCloskey (145), Shayne Tate (152), Donnie Conrad (189) and Johnny Miller (215) all won third place medals for the Eagles.
McCloskey (11-4) pinned Nathan Mills of Hollidaysburg, just beating the first-period buzzer in 1:55 and decisioned Mike Harkless of Mount Union 9-6. In round three, Sam dropped a 5-3 match to Claysburg’s Aaron Doroba. In the battle for third place, McCloskey came back to record a 17-3 major decision over Vance Meyers of Huntingdon. McCloskey used a reversal in each period and added a takedown and added nine nearfall points. Tate (9-5) bested Kyle Thompson of Huntingdon 6-2, majored Altoona’s Zach Bulow 16-4 and Dustin Drake of Mount Union, 15-5, before suffering a 4-0 loss to Hollidaysburg’s Zach Fradeneck. In the third-place finals, Tate got an easy win by injury defeat over Drake in 0:01. Conrad (6-7) pinned Ben Parry of Claysburg-Kimmel, in 3:09, was pinned in 5:58 by Lyle Kylor of Mount Union, then decked Josh Keagy of Bellwood-Antis in 3:01. In the consolation final for third place, Conrad took advantage of a reversal and three back points in the middle stanza for a 7-5 win over Dave Williams of Altoona. Miller (7-4) won three times by pin, getting Claysburg’s Brandon Lackey in 4:52, Mark McMurray of Altoona in 4:16, and Levi Snyder of Hollidaysburg in 1:53. Miller’s only setback was an 18-3 tech fall to eventual 215-pound champ Josh Heaster of Juniata Valley in 3:58. In the third place finals, Miller made a first-period takedown and final period escape stand up for a 3-1 win over Southern Huntingdon’s Landon McElrath.
Bellwood-Antis had three third place medalists in Eli Colyer (125), Rick Shawley (135) and Josh Ervine (140).
Colyer (8-3) decked Landon Yingling of Southern Huntingdon, in 0:42 and won by 15-0 tech fall over Ben Little of Central, in 6:00, before falling 9-6 to eventual 125-pound runner-up Dave Grove of Mount Union. In the consolation finals, Colyer edged Daniel Knott of Claysburg-Kimmel for third place. Shawley (10-3) began by edging Ryan Colmer of Hollidaysburg, 6-4 in overtime, majored Eli Snyder of Southern Huntingdon 14-2, lost a 7-0 decision to eventual 135-pound champ Keith Ryan of Mount Union, before coming back to shut out Tyrone’s John Markel 7-0. In the third-place finals, Colyer majored Pete Cassarly of Mount Union 9-0. Ervine (13-3) in what arguably was the toughest weight class at the Zeigler Tournament, opened with a fall over Kory Knable of Huntingdon, in 0:26 before dropping a 1-0 decision to eventual 140-pound champ and Outstanding Wrestler Justin Berrier of Southern Huntingdon. A second period escape by Berrier proved to be the only score of the match. Ervine pinned Central’s Eli Tomlinson in 0:44. In the semifinals. Josh was decisioned 5-3 by Christian Harr of Hollidaysburg, who was the runner-up at 140, 5-3. In the third-place consolation, Ervine pinned Dolan Mosser of Claysburg with one tick on the first-period clock.
“We had some setbacks, but we had some positive results too,” said Bellwood-Antis coach Ron Wilson. “We can’t dwell on the negatives, we have to keep working with the positives, build on those. We wrestled a lot of matches today, got a lot of experience and it will serve us well when we go into the matches later on down the road. We were pretty pleased with our performances, but we lost some of the matches where we should have won.”
Tyrone had J. P. VanAllman (130), and James Updike (171) finish fourth, Anthony Roman (125) and Brandon Oswalt (275) finish fifth, while the Blue Devils had Don Partner (112) and Brandon Beech (130) with fifth place finishes.
VanAllman (8-8) defeated Brandon Beech of Bellwood-Antis 10-4, pinned Adam Oldham of Juniata Valley, in 1:50, and Allan Seibert of Southern Huntingdon, in 2:45, while losing by tech fall to eventual 130-pound champ Kevin Ryan of Mount Union. In the consi-final for third place, VanAllman led 4-2 after one period, but Brett Shoenfelt of Hollidaysburg registered a reversal and two back points in the second period to pull out a 9-5 decision. Updike (8-6) edged Mount Union’s Zach Hicks 6-5 and pinned Joel Berger of Central, in 4:20, was pinned by Hollidaysburg’s Brian Shaw, who picked up his 100th career win one round earlier and then doubled up D. J. Zimmerman of Altoona, 10-5. In the third place finals, Updike was pinned by Mike Snyder of Claysburg-Kimmel in 2:39. Romano (9-7) lost a 10-1 major decision to Daniel Knott of Claysburg, was pinned by Stuart Rhoades of Hollidaysburg, in 1:36, then came back with three straight pins of his own to claim fifth place. Oswalt (5-9) opened by getting pinned by eventual 275-pound champ Ryan Everhart of Huntingdon, in 3:09 and Jeremy Rhodes of Central, in 1:00, then decked Hollidaysburg’s Philip Gowin in 3:20, edged Mike Wilson of Mount Union 2-1, and pinned Matt Harnish of Juniata Valley in 1:27.
Partner (6-9) dropped a 9-1 major decision to Altoona’s Johnny Sneed and was pinned by eventual 112-pound champ Cody Myers of Southern Huntingdon, in 1:40. Partner won by injury default over Juniata Valley’s Brandon Foster and then pinned Adam Bough of Central, in 1:12 and Mark Smeyers of Huntingdon, in 5:40 to reverse a loss by fall to Smeyers in the dual meet. Beech (7-8) followed his loss to VanAllman with a 6-3 loss by decision to Kevin Ryan. Despite an injured elbow, Beech rallied to down Allen Seibert of Southern Huntingdon 8-5, pin Adam Oldham of Juniata valley in 1:27 and shut out Chris Smith of Altoona 6-0.
Cody Reese (1-5) picked up his first varsity win with a 1-4 effort for seventh place at 140,, and John Markel (0-13) went 0-4 to finish ninth at 135, for Tyrone.
Tim Collier (3-4) won a pair of matches at 119 to place seventh for Bellwood-Antis, Ronnie Wilson (9-9) went 1-4 to finish seventh at 152, Garett Wyland (3-10) was 1-3 to finish sixth at 171, and Dustin Harris (5-9), Josh Keagy (1-10) and Cody Smith (1-11) were each 0-4 over the weekend.
Tyrone finished with 257 points, followed by Hollidaysburg with 222.5, Mount Union with 212, Huntingdon 203.5, Southern Huntingdon 201.5, Altoona 178, Claysburg-Kimmel 137, Bellwood-Antis 102.5 and Juniata Valley, without three-time defending PIAA champ Garrett Scott, who broke his jaw in practice, and Central tied for the final spot with 62.5 points.
“It is not unlike life,” explained Packer. “These kids are going through little battles now. Going through a six-minute battle and not giving up is a big part of winning, regardless of the score.
”As a team, we wanted to see how far we have come from the beginning of the season until now, hoping to be competitive. I think the kids came in with that in mind and wrestled very well. We kind of expected Waite be a champion, but Schopp being Mansberger was great, an added bonus. I can’t say enough about Justin and the hard work he puts in.”
