State College wrestling opens season with win over BEA

State College wrestling coach Ryan Cummins didn’t know what to expect Thursday night when his Little Lions opened the season by hosting county rival Bald Eagle Area.

The Eagles had already wrestled a dual meet and a tournament. The Little Lions had only wrestled each other.

Even without several expected starters missing from the lineup as they work their way into wrestling shape just a week after football season ended, State College won 8 of 14 bouts to earn a 39-30 win over BEA.

“The kids wrestled great,” Cummins said. “They did a heckuva job. We didn’t know what to expect. This is our first go. They really stepped up and did a great job.”

The Little Lions scored three falls, accepted two forfeits and tacked on three decisions. Bald Eagle Area recorded two falls, had two forfeit wins and two decisions.

“It was not our plan,” BEA coach Steve Millward said. “Stay off your back or get off your back. We gave up too many points at those upper weights that we didn’t have enough time or enough matches to make up.”

The match started at 145 pounds and a chess match of moves and counter moves started immediately. Each team shifted multiple wrestlers to different weights trying to exploit matchups.

With each team forfeiting two weights, those matchups loomed large in the contested matches.

State College won five of the first seven bouts to race out to a 27-6 lead after the 220-pound bout.

Bald Eagle Area won by decision at 145 and 160 with wins by Cobey Bainey and Jacob Crestani, respectively.

State College countered with a falls from Dalton Barger at 152, Cole Urbas at 182 and Cory Dreibelbis at 220. Isaiah Lose received a forfeit at 195 and Brett Fields earned a decision at 170.

BEA cut the lead to 27-18 as heavyweight Josh Fye needed just 8 seconds to rack up a pin and 103-pounder Garret Giedroc received a forfeit.

State College ran its lead out to 33-18 when Ari Gluckman received a forfeit at 113.

That left four matches to wrestle. The teams split those four matches and that enabled State College to hold off BEA.

Little Lion Jacob Pammer won what might have been the decisive match of the night with a 5-1 decision at 120 to increase the Little Lions’ lead to 36-18.

“(The match at) 120 was a pivotal bout for us. It decided what we were going to do at those last few weights. It really hurt us from 170 on up,” Millward said.

“That’s where we were hoping to minimize any damage that they could do. We knew what we had from 126 to 145. It was not how we envisioned this ending.”

BEA’s Garrett Rigg accepted a forfeit at 126 to close the gap to 36-24. The Eagles needed two pins to tie the match.

State College’s Trey Millward, however, ended those thoughts at 132. He gave up the initial takedown but then scored five unanswered points to earn a 5-2 decision and seal the win.

BEA’s Seth Koleno ended the night with a first-period fall at 138.

“Our kids have really put in a lot of hard work these last three weeks. It definitely showed tonight,” Cummins said. “They’re going at it hard in practice. It seems like they’re really into it. They came in ready to wrestle at the beginning of the season and it’s really showing now.”

And wrestling a rival seemed to give the Little Lions the motivation they needed to overcome the early season mat time BEA had logged.

“Having somebody right around the corner makes it a little bit more important to them,” Cummins said. “They did great. I couldn’t ask for much more.”

This story was originally published December 11, 2015 at 1:28 AM with the headline "State College wrestling opens season with win over BEA."