Waynesburg doesn’t wait around to rout C-M
WAYNESBURG – This time, there was no waiting in the gymnasium.
This time, there was no going over the number of tiebreakers.
This time, there was just an overwhelming effort by Waynesburg in a 48-13 rout of rival Canon-McMillan that should all but wrap up the Class 3A Section 4A subsection.
Waynesburg won 10 of the 13 bouts in increasing the Raiders’ section mark to 3-0. Canon-McMillan fell to 2-1. One section match remains for both teams but Waynesburg appears to be a lock.
Unlike last year, the outcome was decided early. Last year, it took until the 10th tiebreaker to determine the winner.
“I don’t know. That was a great dual meet last year,” said Waynesburg head coach Joe Throckmorton. “That was probably the best I’ve been arond and I’ve been around a long, long time.
“I’m proud of the boys because they all wrestled hard. I told the boys that this is the biggest rivalry since wrestling started. So they’ll wrestle hard against us in every single match. We didn’t take anyone lightly.”
Mac Church started Waynesburg’s opening run with a 3-1 decision over Jacob Houpt at 120 pounds and Zander Phaturos followed with a 14-1 major decision against Conlan O’Donoghue at 126.
Canon-McMillan forfeited at 132 and Cole Homet (138) and returning state champion Wyatt Henson (145) registered pins to make it 25-0.
Rocco Welsh (152) made it 29-0 with a 14-5 major decision over Gianni Martini. When Nick Stephenson won a 7-6 decision over Gabriel Stafford at 160, the possibility of shutting out Canon-McMillan was a reality.
But Matthew Furman ended the drought when he pinned Waynesburg’s Darnell Johnson at 172 pounds. Eli Makel got the points back when he pinned Nikko Martini in 1:28. Ryan Howard also had a pin at heayweight for the Raiders.
“Everybody is trying to get better,” said Throckmorton. “I’m proud of all of them.”
One of the better matches came at 106, where Andrew Binni of the Big Macs won a hard-fought 3-1 decision in overtime. Binni hit a spin-around move in overtime to win it.
“I thought our kids battled hard up and down the lineup.” said Canon-McMillan head coach Jeff Havelka. “Waynesburg has a really solid team but I’m proud of our kids. I don’t think we took a backseat to them. We wrestled them well and we’re proud of the effort. We’ll get back at it (Thursday).”
Both teams will compete in the Powerade Tournament this weekend. Action gets underway Friday at the Convention Center in Monroeville.
“I’m going to tell the kids that we’re proud of them and the way they work,” said Havelka. “We’ve been working really good practices and we’ll continue that. I’ll tell them don’t dwell on this. Tomorrow is a new day and we are going to work to get better.”