Harvey, Boyertown closes in on three-peat

FORT WASHINGTON >> He reached the 150-win mark for his scholastic career, scored two pins on the night and is part of another trip to Hershey for state-level duals action.

And yet, Gregg Harvey knows it can get even better for him and Boyertown.

“This is only the beginning of the road,” Harvey said after the Bears’ sweep of Friday’s matches from the District 1 Class AAA Duals Tournament. “We’ve got a long way to go.”

Boyertown put itself in position for a three-peat as the district’s team champion with two dominating performances at Upper Dublin. It opened with a 61-6 romp over Pioneer Athletic Conference rival Spring-Ford in the quarterfinal round, then handled Upper Darby in the semifinals, 68-9.

In the process, the Bears punched their ticket as one of four district qualifiers to the state show. They will be looking to erase the frustration of the last two years, when they went 2-2 and bowed out short of medal finishes.

“We’ve come so far as a team,” Harvey said. “We look and strive everyday to get a state medal.”

Council Rock South will be standing between Boyertown and a three-peat. The second-seeded Hawks handled Downingtown East in the other semifinal, 44-21, after rallying for a 33-30 win over Owen J. Roberts.

“They’re a tough, hard-nosed team,” Boyertown head coach Pete Ventresca said of South, which it saw in action at the Escape the Rock Tournament in January. The tournament’s host team placed third in the standings behind the Bears by less than seven points. “We know they’re going to come out to wrestle.”

There was no question about the Bears’ readiness Friday. They got pairs of pins from Chris Berry (145, 152), Hunter Vogels (152, 160), Jordan Wood (220) and Tommy Killoran (285).

Then there was Harvey, who got No. 150 against the Rams before continuing his roll with a pin of Upper Darby’s Coltrane Mosley-Jo. Boyertown’s senior 182-pounder (37-5) reached his milestone victory in fine fashion, rolling up a 23-8 score on Spring-Ford’s Chase Smith to get the technical fall at the 5:09 mark.

“It was a big night,” he said. “I got to check off another goal, which was made possible with help from my coaches and teammates.

Another mark in Harvey’s sights is the Boyertown program’s win total of 170, set by 2010 graduate Alex Pellicciotti. At the same time, two other Bears could follow Harvey to the 150-win plateau this year.

“Lucas (Miller) and Jordan (Wood) both have a shot at 150,” Ventresca said. “They’ve all had amazing careers.”

Boyertown’s success was tempered by two other PAC-10 teams seeing their duals participation end. Spring-Ford and Owen J. Roberts both went two-and-out. The Rams lost on a tiebreaker to West Chester Rustin off the setback to the Bears – their second meeting in little more than a week – and the Wildcats fell to Rock South (33-30) and Pennridge (35-29).

Boyertown (18-0) took charge of the rematch with Spring-Ford in the upper weights, starting with Harvey’s technical fall at 182. The Bears followed with successive pins from Brody O’Connell (195), Jordan Wood (220) and Tom Killoran (285) to assume a 23-6 lead before their lightweights stepped into action.

The Boyertown roll continued with Matt Wilde scoring a gritty 3-1 overtime win at 106 before Jakob Campbell put up a tech-fall at 113. David Campbell then gutted out a 1-0 verdict against Hunter Mitch at 120, and Lucas Miller administered the clincher with a 14-1 major at 126.

“The kids wrestled well,” Ventresca said. “It’s big how things can snowball.”

Closing out the Bears’ dominating effort were Garrett Mauger (tech-fall at 132), J.T. Cooley (pin at 138), Chris Berry (pin at 1456) and Hunter Vogels (pin at 152). The final tally: 10 of 12 weights where Boyertown got bonus points, six pins, three technical falls, 61 unanswered points.

“For us, we don’t look at the scores,” Harvey said. “We know if everyone pulls their weight, we’re going to get the scores. If we don’t, we’re not going to get the big points.”

The Rams’ points came from decisions by Brent McGill and Steve Rice. McGill blanked Zach Rek at 160, 5-0, and Rice outdueled Elijah Jones at 170, 5-1.

Owen J. bounced back from an opening-bout loss to Rock South by taking six of the next seven weights. Pins by Micky Kohn (170), Nick Duliakas (182) and Connor Mitchell (182) meshed with Luke Resnick’s technical fall at 106, Tyler McCutchen’s major at 113 and a regular decision by William Scherfel at 285 for a solid 30-6 lead on the Hawks.

But it was all South the rest of the way. It racked up two pins, a major decision and a three-pointer before getting the clincher at 152: Lucas Martoccio’s technical fall at 152.
“We knew where they are strong, and we wanted to get a lot of points early,” OJR head coach Steve DeRafelo said. “We had a couple things go our way.”

Connor Mitchell had a two-pin night to head the ‘Cats, who have three more PAC-10 bouts before the league’s championship tournament in two weeks.
“We can take a lot of things from here,” DeRafelo said. “Our guys went toe-to-toe with the best teams in the district. There are things we need to work on … that’s important.”

Spring-Ford (16-6) took a 33-30 lead into the 160-pound finale, only to see Rustin get a decision that forced a 33-33 deadlock. The deciding factor for Rustin was a 3-2 edge in pins.

“They (Rustin) had a couple wins early,” head coach Tim Seislove recalled, “and it was back-and-forth the whole time. I’m proud of the kids for being in this situation. It was a good team effort.”

That’s what Ventresca and his Boyertown coaching staff are seeking from their grapplers in the title bout with Rock South. It will be a rematch of last year’s championship pairing, the

Bears scoring a 34-26 victory to defend their duals crown.

“We have one more match (Saturday),” he said. “That’s the only thing on our minds now.”

NOTES >> Other first-round outcomes saw Upper Darby hold off West Chester Rustin, 35-30; and Downingtown East get by Pennridge, 32-28. … Saturday’s wrestlebacks will have Downingtown East and West Chester Rustin in one state qualifier while Pennridge and Upper Darby face off in the other. Those matches will be at 1 p.m., preceding the Boyertown/Rock South tilt at 3. … Harvey on reaching Pellicciotti’s program-record win total: “It’s doable, but the main goal is to get back on the (state) podium.”