By Pete Chiodo
Meadville Tribune
February 10, 2012 7:00 a.m. CAMBRIDGE SPRINGS —
Non-region wrestling foes Union City and Cambridge Springs seemed to want to savor nearly every second of their respective regular season finales.
Going head-to-head Thursday night, eight of the 12 contested bouts went the distance; seven of them were won by decision; and five of those seven were decided by two points or less.
Union City came out of it with the win, 40-21.
“We knew there were going to be some good matchups, because Cambridge has a couple very tough kids,” said Union City head coach Ed Margie. “There was some good matches to watch. And I thought there was good wrestling on both sides. We just wrestled more aggressively, I think.”
The win by Union City drops Cambridge Springs to 16-12 on the campaign. The Bears, meanwhile, finish the year at 9-5 in dual matches.
“We definitely improved a lot from last year,” said the Bears’ junior 170-pounder Tim Vargo. “We had a lot of kids working hard in the room. Hopefully next year we can improve off of this year. We’ve got (13) juniors this year. So we’ll have a ton of seniors next year. It should be a good year.”
As for last night, one of the highlights of the match was the 285-pound match — the last one of the night — between Union City’s Jeff Burger, ranked fifth in the state according to Pennsylvania Wrestling Rankings; and Cambridge Springs’ Justin East, ranked 14th.
“(East) is a tough opponent,” said Burger. “I knew he was going to be tough this year after wrestling him last year. I just knew I had to push through and come out strong. It was going to be a good match.”
The two heavies battled on their feet for most of the first period before Burger pounced on East for a takedown with 10 seconds left. East escaped shortly thereafter.
East managed to ride Burger for most of the second period, but Burger wrenched himself free with 11 seconds remaining.
Neither would score from neutral in the third period, and Burger left the mat a 3-1 victor.
“You knew Burger and East was going to be a good matchup,” said Margie.
But that wasn’t the only narrow victory of the night.
For the Bears, 220-pounder Storm McDonald scored an escape early in the third period, and stayed on his feet the rest of the way to grab a 3-2 victory over the Blue Devils’ Matt Lydic.
And the 132-pound bout between Union City’s Tyler Lindsley and the Spa’s Zack Krien also went down to the wire. Neither wrestler scored through the first two periods. But Lindsley notched a reversal with 25 seconds left in the third for a 2-0 decision.
At 160, Cambridge Springs’ Dylan Reynolds and Union City’s Josh Reinke were evenly matched. But Reynolds was awarded two points on separate technical violations and came away with the 4-2 win.
At 182, the Spa’s Ryan East and Union City’s Cody Thomas were tied 8-8 through regulation. Then East notched a takedown with 16.6 seconds remaining in overtime win it 10-8.
Cambridge’s 120-pounder Devin Mitchell added a 6-1 victory over Union City’s Dustin Tomcho. And Vargo, ranked 10th in the state, notched the match’s other decision, beating the Spa’s Weston Stafford 8-3 at 170.
Cambridge added a pair of falls to their tally. At 138, Jaim Creecraft pinned UC’s Russell Adams in 3:39. And at 195, Quentin Stafford stuck the Bears’ Sturgis Coulter in 3:08.
Union City earned pins from Stacy Lindstrom at 145, which ended a close match against Jake Pond with a fall in 5:20. And at 152, Jarred Brooks pinned Colton Cox in 1:11.
“We had some guys that wrestled well,” said Cambridge Springs head coach Jeff Hiner. “Jaim wrestled real well. Devin wrestled a good match. Zach’s match was a close one. I’m not concerned about that. We’ll see (Tyler Lindsley) again at sections. And that’s Zach’s first match at 132. He’s been at 126 for most of theyear. At 145 and 152 we’ve got to do a better job there. Those were both matches that were winnable. We didn’t wrestle smart there.”
