Here are Centre County’s high school wrestling leaders through Feb. 16

We’re in the final stretch of high school wrestling season, as the postseason kicked off this past week for four of Centre County’s teams.

Bald Eagle Area, Penns Valley, Philipsburg-Osceola and St. Joseph’s Catholic Academy all wrestled in the District 6 Class 2A championships on Friday and Saturday. They combined to have six champions and 22 moved closer to the PIAA championships in three weeks.

Bellefonte had one final dual with Shikellamy on Tuesday. State College has been off since competing in the the PIAA Class 3A dual team championships a week ago. The Red Raiders and Little Lions have their District 6 championships on Saturday in Altoona.

In this week’s leaderboard updates, it was no surprise to see Eagles, Rams, Mounties and Wolves making moves all over the place.

Here’s where things settled this week:

Wins

Last week, the county had just three wrestlers that had 30-plus wins on the season. Well, seven more joined that club this week to make 10 county wrestlers with 30-plus wins.

Those seven wrestlers include BEA’s Coen Bainey, Cooper Gilham and Gage McClenahan, Bellefonte’s Jude Swisher, Penns Valley’s Clayton Royer and Malachi DuVall and St. Joseph’s Keegan Rothrock.

There are a handful that are on the cusp of getting No. 30, so next week will be interesting to see who else gets to that mark.

The leader remained the same in the Wolves’ Caleb Dowling, who has 36 on the season. He collected four wins in four different ways — pin, technical fall, major decision, decision in that order — on the way to his third consecutive District 6 title. The most recent came at 152 pounds. The senior was a district finalist all four years of high school.

Dowling’s teammate Tyler Stoltzfus still holds down the No. 2 spot with 34 wins. Stoltzfus only had to win three bouts in the district championships to claim the 170-pound title. It was Stoltzfus’ second straight District 6 title.

Bainey, Gilham and McClenahan all reached 31 wins on the season as they each made the district finals for their respective weight classes. They are tied for third in the county. Bainey was the lone winner of the three in the finals.

His 31 wins has him just eight shy of tying the Eagles’ freshman mark set by Quentin Wright in the 2004-2005 season. Bainey’s 30th was a 16-0 technical fall of Tyrone’s Korry Walls in 5:22 in the semifinals.

Gilham’s and McClenahan’s 30th wins came in the quarterfinals. Gilham used a 9-1 major decision over Richland’s Austin Syfert. McClenahan had a 21-6 technical fall over Cambria Heights’ Jalen Kovac in 4:43.

DuVall and Royer earned their 30th wins in the semifinals too. Royer pinned P-O’s Chase Chapman in 5:23 to beat the Mounties’ wrestler twice in a two-week span. DuVall stuck a 12-4 major decision on Westmont Hilltop’s Hudson Holbay. It was also DuVall’s 100th career win. Ironically, Holbay was going for his 100th too in the bout against DuVall. Holbay did get his 100th later in the tournament.

Rothrock’s 30th win also came against a county wrestler in P-O’s Hunter Weitoish in the 160-pound finals. Rothrock topped Weitoish 9-7 in sudden victory for the crown.

Swisher pinned Shikellamy’s Caleb Yoder on Tuesday in 2:53 for his 30th win, which leads the Red Raiders.

Chapman and the Wolves’ Amonn Ohl also earned their 100th career victories this weekend. Chapman had a 17-4 major decision over Claysburg-Kimmel’s Cade Keithley in the consolation semifinals for his on Saturday. Ohl pinned Penn Cambria’s Austin Link in 20 seconds in the round of 16 on Friday.

St. Joseph’s Zack Witmer is part of that handful of wrestlers needing just one more win for No. 30. He earned four on way to 138-pound district title. He followed the same path as Dowling en route to the crown.

Here are the four wrestlers that earned victory No. 20 this week:

Bald Eagle Area: The Eagles had a pair in Noah Foltz (22 wins) and Jeffre Pifer (20) join the list this week. Foltz and Pifer earned their 20th win in the round of 16 with pins. Foltz took care of Forest Hills’ Michael Vasbinder in 2:30. Pifer stuck Central’s Tyler Biesinger in 1:30.

Penns Valley: Justin Darlington (21) came up just short of qualifying for regionals, but he was able to get to 20-plus wins on the season. Darlington had an 8-2 win over Huntingdon’s Eden Wagner in the consolation third round at 113 pounds.

Philipsburg-Osceola: Gabe Dunkelberger (21) became the fifth Mounties’ wrestler to eclipse the 20-win mark. He topped Moshannon Valley’s Alex Richner 10-2 for win No. 20.

Falls

DuVall, who is the county leader with 24 pins on the season, used two falls to reach the 152-pound semifinals. He wrestled a total of 4 minutes and 8 seconds, so just over two periods of wrestling to get to the semis.

He isn’t the only county wrestler to have 20-plus pins either now. McClenahan and Stoltzfus joined him this week.

McClenahan had a pin in his round of 16 match with Marion Center’s Calvin Rombaugh. Stoltzfus pinned his way to his district title, which means he collected three. They each have 20 and are tied for second.

Swisher is tied with teammate Ethan Richner for fourth in the county with 19. Swisher collected a pin against Shikellamy on Tuesday as Richner, who suffered an injury in the district team duals two weeks ago, received a forfeit.

BEA’s David Close amassed the most pins this week with four on way to a third-place finish at 220 pounds. He is now up to 16 on the year and is tied with Bainey and Rothrock for seventh most in the county.

Bainey had two in his title run, starting with one in 59 seconds and ending with another in 19 seconds. Rothrock had just one and it was his opener against West Branch’s Hayes Jones in the round of 16.

Bellefonte’s Alex Coppolo added another fall this week to get 15. He is tied with teammate Aidan O’Shea, the Mounties’ Nick Coudriet and State College’s Owen Woolcott for 10th in the county.

Here are the wrestlers that were able to get their 10th fall this week:

Bald Eagle Area: Foltz (11 pins) had an impressive weekend in securing his first regional berth. Not only did the sophomore collect pin No. 10, he had three total. His 10th was a 27-seconds victory over Central’s Lane Kocher in the consolation fourth round. He then pinned Huntingdon’s Briar Deline in the next round to secure his regional spot.

Penns Valley: Andrew Sharer (10) and Micah Fetterolf (10) each got to 10 pins on the season. They each had three in the district tournament. Sharer, who has just 16 wins on the season and now a district crown, used two to reach the 182-pound semifinals. The other came in the finals, which was No. 10, when he pinned Huntingdon’s Myles Baney, who was the No. 1 seed. Fetterolf’s 10th was a 3:22 defeat of Tyrone’s Dominick Maloney in the 145-pound consolation third round.

Philipsburg-Osceola: Austin Foster (11) is one of six regional qualifiers for the Mounties. He began his run in the district tournament with a fall of West Branch’s Aaron Myers, which was No. 10 for Foster.

St. Joseph’s: Dowling (10) is a dominant wrestler, but he isn’t known for pinning his opponents. Well, he earned pin No. 10 by sticking Cambria Heights’ Ty Stockley in 46 seconds in the round of 16.

Major Decisions

There are a pair of P-O wrestlers leading the way here. Chapman is the overall leader with nine major decisions on the season. Dunkelberger is just two behind, but won’t be able to catch up as his season ended in Altoona.

Chapman had three major decisions on his way to a third-place finish at 138 pounds. He made the semifinals by outscoring his opponents 22-5. The senior then used that previously mentioned 17-4 victory over Keithley to make the consolation finals.

Dunkelberger had two in his tournament run. He opened the district championships with the previously mentioned 10-2 defeat of Richner. Dunkelberger used an 18-5 win over Huntingdon’s Morgan McDivitt to get within one round of qualifying for regionals. He ultimately fell in the next round.

Gilham climbed up one spot on the board by earning his fourth major decision this season. He topped Richland’s Austin Syfert 9-1 to make the 120-pound semifinals. Gilham is tied for fourth in the county with State College’s Lance Urbas.

Penns Valley’s Cole Felker, who has only been wrestling since the beginning of January, was able to collect his third major decision this week. He topped Deline 11-2 to finish seventh at 160 pounds, and is tied with Bainey, the Red Raiders’ Ethan Rossman and the Little Lions’ Clayton Leidy for sixth most in the county.

Ohl, Dowling, Witmer and Penns Valley’s Dristen Wolfe all joined the pack of wrestlers that have two major decisions this season. They each added one this week.

Fastest Falls & Technical Falls

There were no new times added to the fastest falls list this week. There were several that were close in Ohl, Witmer, Foltz and Bainey, who had sub-30 second pins, but they needed to be under 14 seconds. Ohl still has the fastest time in the county with a five-seconds fall.

The top three remained the same in the technical falls category with Royer, Dowling and Witmer. Royer and Dowling remained tied at the top as each added a technical fall this week. The seniors now have 11 on the season.

Royer beat Central Cambria’s Adam McCullough 17-2 in 5:46 to make the 138-pound semifinals. Dowling also used a technical fall to make the semifinals. He shut out Southern Huntingdon’s Wyatt Campbell 16-0 in 2:17.

Witmer is up to eight on the season. His eighth was a 15-0 shutout of Keithley in the quarterfinals.

McClenahan’s previously mentioned 21-6 win over Kovacs was his third technical fall of the season. He is tied for eighth in the county with Stoltzfus, Leidy and Bellefonte’s Lane Aikey.

Wins

Falls

Fastest Fall

Technical Falls

Major Decisions

This story was originally published February 16, 2020 at 3:00 PM.

Nate Cobler

Centre Daily Times

814-231-4609

Nate Cobler is a part-time reporter covering all things wrestling, either Penn State or Centre County’s high schools, for the Centre Daily Times. He’ll also cover other sports too. When he isn’t writing about sports, he is working for a local mortgage broker, Providence Mortgage Group.