A familiar face hoisted the PIAA Championship trophy Saturday afternoon, Casey Taylor. Taylor led the Reynolds Raiders to their third straight PIAA Team Championship. The Raiders came out of an exciting dual with the Southern Columbia Tiger with a 31-23 victory. The dual was in question down to the very last bout. 

Trailing by five, #8 Cade Linn took the mat for the Tigers against #20 Hunter Thompson for the Raiders. You have to think a technical fall is out of the question when initially looking at the final matchup. However, that wasn’t the case as Linn put up four first period takedowns and stormed out to an 8-3 lead at the 1:16 mark of the first period. Thompson completely changed the bout with a takedown late in the first period to close the match down to a two-point lead for Linn headed into period number two. Thompson continued to turn the tide in his favor with a full period ride in the second, and a reversal in the third period. Thompson put the icing on the cake with the sudden victory takedown to cap Reynolds third straight PIAA AA Team Championship.

Here are some final thoughts on the AA Team Championships. All bouts are archived and available for on-demand viewing. Box scores and linked matches are available through FloArena.

Role Wrestlers Make Championship High School Teams

The headlines normally go to the stars, the acknowledgement is well-deserved. It doesn’t mean we should forget about the role wrestlers that are very instrumental for championship teams in high school wrestling. A ‘role wrestler’ can be defined in various ways. It might be a backup that gives you flexibility to move starters to a more advantageous matchup. The role wrestler could be someone that wrestles outside of their own weight class because they can’t win their natural weight in the room. They could be a career junior varsity wrestler that is finally getting their shot. You can’t zero in on what a role wrestler is, you have to paint it with a broad brush when defining it. However, they are easy to spot when you look at championship teams. 

The term role player often is interpreted as a derogatory way to describe a player in other sports. Often these role players are the guys that are most respected by their peers and teammates. Don’t even begin to think ‘role wrestler’ has a negative connotation with it. This weekend I saw wrestlers that fit the bill as a role wrestler on all the teams taking the mat Saturday afternoon in the medal matches. They were sometimes thrown to the wolves and fought for to minimize bonus points. Sometimes they weighed-in just above their normal weight class so they could bump up an extra weight class to help the team. 

On one occasion a role wrestler pulled off an upset over a state ranked wrestler. In today’s society it’s difficult to find these team players. Guys or girls that are there day-in and day-out knowing their own individual state championship isn’t going to happen, but they grind away in the practice room just the same. Doing what they can to help the team. These are the wrestlers that win the dual championships and programs that can retain them on the roster have a great chance to succeed. Respect is due to all the wrestlers on the roster.

Injury Bug Takes Down Saucon Valley

Don’t get me wrong, Saucon Valley wasn’t the only team slowed by injuries in the Giant Center. Every team had some kind of injury or sickness to overcome, Saucon Valley just appeared to be missing the most firepower from their optimal lineup. Saucon Valley was missing two wrestlers ranked in the top ten. Both #3 Matt Arciuolo, 160lbs, and #9 Chris Arciuolo, 106lbs, missed the entire tournament for the Panthers. 

Despite the injuries Saucon Valley took one of the most exciting duals of the tournament over the Burrell Bucs 32-25 in the quarterfinals. Down the stretch the Panthers won two key bouts after trailing late in the match. This grit was representative of the team that battled short-handed all weekend. The Panthers were over-matched by Reynolds in the semifinals 46-20, and failed to medal after a narrow 33-32 defeat at the hands of perennial power Brookville. Let’s hope the Panthers get healthy for the individual postseason.

Super-Freshmen Flex Muscle

Ryan Crookham and Gavin Garcia both are top 5 on the Freshman Big Board. Ryan Crookham announced his arrival on the high school scene with his title at the 2017 Super32. Just one problem, he wasn’t in high school. He won that title as an eighth grader. Now that he’s a freshman at Notre Dame-Green Pond Crookham has continued to prove he is one of the best in the nation at the high school level. Crookham only wrestled two bouts this weekend, but both were against high quality opponents. Crookham was victorious by technical fall over 2018 PIAA qualifier Bailey Gimbor of Hamburg.

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Crookham’s other victory was the premier individual matchup on the AA side. In the preliminary round Crookham matched up with 2017 PIAA State Champion Beau Bayless in the final bout of the dual. Crookham held a 1-0 advantage after a second period ride and third period escape. In the pivotal sequence of the match Crookham turned the corner to a near-side cradle off of Bayless’ knee-pull single. Bayless was able to fight off the fall, but Crookham took the 6-0 win. Look for this rematch at the PIAA State Tournament, Live on FloWrestling. Unfortunately, Crookham will not have any prestige points for the PIAA separation system, it is likely to be in the semifinals. 

Gavin Garcia doesn’t have the national credentials of Crookham. That’s mainly due to his prowess on the football field. Gavin racked up 655 rushing yards and had 14 total touchdowns in his freshman season. He averaged a staggering 13.4 yards per carry. His best performances of the season came in the state playoff series running twice for over 100 yards and two touchdowns. This is all while his older brother and #2 ranked receiver in the country, Julian Fleming, are featured for the State Champion Southern Columbia Tigers.  Garcia has even seen limited mat time so far this season as he recovered from some lingering injuries. That didn’t keep him from being a key contributor to the Tigers runner-up finish this weekend.

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Garcia had four bonus point victories in four matches. Garcia posted two falls and two major decisions. One of the major decisions came against senior state ranked Wes Davenport of Conneaut Area. Garcia has a deep field with credentialed juniors and seniors waiting for him in Hershey in a few weeks, it will be fun to watch and see how he stacks up.

Reynolds is the Gold Standard

The PIAA Team Championships have been contested twenty-one times. Reynolds has qualified for the tournament eighteen times. All three times they haven’t been in the field came in the early days of the tournament when District 10 qualified just one team. The Raiders have won the last three titles on the AA side and have six dual titles in their history. They have been in the title match ten times. That is an incredible stat for any school. Now factor in that the calculated enrollment for wrestling purposes at Reynolds is 131 students. The biggest AA school calculated enrollment is Westmont Hilltop with 293 students. The Raiders defeated Westmont Hilltop 54-9 in the championship quarterfinals. 

Mitch Rupert, who writes for the Williamsport Sun-Gazette, broke down Reynolds Dual dominance in one Tweet.

So how good has @ReynldsWrestlin been at the PIAA Team Wrestling Championships in the 21-year history of the tournament? I tried to quantify it and it turns out they're pretty damn good @PAPowerWrestle @KnopsKnotes pic.twitter.com/Z8HpmHfU6p

— Mitch Rupert (@Mitch_Rupert) February 9, 2019

It’s almost impossible to wrap your head around how consistent the program has been for decades. A large part of their success can be attributed to participation in the program. Reynolds has twenty-eight wrestlers on their roster and used twenty different wrestlers during the Team Championships. They have their superstars, but the amount of quality ‘role wrestlers’ makes this team a contender year-in and year-out. You have to take your hat off to coach Casey Taylor and the whole Reynolds Raider program.