WESTTOWN — Either direction West Chester Rustin coach Brad Harkins turned, a former state qualifier of his was in view.
The problem was, Costas Hatzipavlides and Brett Kaliner were up in the stands as college students now, and down the bench, Dan Labus and Collin Hurley were in street clothes with injuries.
Regardless, Harkins stuck to the plan and counted on his younger and inexperienced wrestlers to fill the gaps. Wednesday, at home, the Golden Knights did just that, pulling away from West Chester East, 38-24, in a non-league dual meet.
Rustin’s Zach Jones (Nate Heckenberger – For Digital First Media)
“I’m extremely proud with our effort,” Harkins said. “We stress, as a group, that it’s all about team and when someone goes down the next guy has to contribute. We had a lot of inexperienced guys who worked their tails off and our guys fed off that.”
Right off the bat, two of East’s top kids, Corey Celenza (126 pounds) and Tommy Luke (132) got to work, but Rustin managed to give up just three bonus points to that pair.
That would be the theme of the night as East (4-1 overall) won six bouts with a total of six bonus points, while Rustin (1-0) scored 14 off of eight wins.
“I take the first bit of the blame,” East coach John Gallo said. “We weren’t ready to wrestle and weren’t physically fit enough. We didn’t manage bonus points and when you wrestle a good team, you have to be able to perform and that’s on me.”
East took a one-point lead thanks to a 1-0 decision by Joe Timm (285) with three to go, when the young Rustin lightweights took over.
Rustin’s bench erupts after Thomas Casey’s pin at 106 pounds. (Nate Heckenberger – For Digital First Media)
Sophomore Thomas Casey (106) earned his first varsity win in four tries when he finished off a fall with two seconds left in the opening period to give the Knights a lead they wouldn’t surrender.
“I wanted to do my best for the team and stay out there for the whole match, no matter what happened,” Casey said.
Two freshmen to keep an eye on, Josh Viarengo (113) and Charlie Baldesari (120), slammed the door shut with a decision and a pin, respectively. Freshman Alex Pratzner also had a pin for Rustin at 138 pounds.
“It was good to see those guys in that type of situation,” Harkins said. “We wanted them to go out and wrestle well and execute and push the pace, and that’s what they did.”
Bryan Hess (145) and Zach Jones (195) won tight swing matches for Rustin, while Tyler Kaliner (152) added a technical fall and Ethan Harkins (170) earned a quick fall.
East was without Jamison Eadie in the middle of the lineup, but got a pin from Andrew DiBernardo and decisions from Tyler Blum (160) and Hugh Lemmon-Kishi (220) on what turned out to be a frustrating night.
East’s Andrew DiBernardo (Nate Heckenberger – For Digital First Media)
“We need to work harder, and that starts with me,” Gallo said. “We’re a good team, but we’re not going to beat other good teams if we don’t perform better than we did (Wednesday).”
Rustin was coming off a less-than-satisfying performance at the Penn Manor tournament last weekend, where another starter, JT Aloisio (220) was injured. The Golden Knights were prohibited to go to their opening weekend tournament by school administration due to the fear of snow, so despite all that had gone wrong in the early season, getting by their crosstown rival was all the more necessary.
“It’s great,” Casey said. “We knew we had it in us and we never lost faith through the whole meet.”
Rustin will wrestle against Boyertown and Chichester Saturday morning at Downingtown West as a make up for losing its opening tournament.
West Chester Rustin 38, West Chester East 24
126- Celenza (WCE) tech. fall Lourido, 6:00 (0-5)
132- T. Luke (WCE) maj. dec. Kosmidis, 13-3 (0-9)
138- Pratzner (WCR) pinned Pelosi, 2:43 (6-9)
145- Hess (WCR) dec. Wolov, 5-3 (9-9)
152- Kaliner (WCR) tech. fall Clifford, 6:00 (14-9)
160- Blum (WCE) dec. Benoit, 8-2 (14-12)
170- E. Harkins (WCR) pinned Fenimore, :24 (20-12)
182- A. DiBernardo (WCE) pinned Rice, :28 (20-18)
195- Jones (WCR) dec. S. Cooper, 3-1 (23-18)
220- Lemmon-Kishi (WCE) dec. O. Walsh, 4-2 (23-21)
285- Timm (WCE) dec. G. Walsh, 1-0 (23-24)
106- Casey (WCR) pinned McCorkle, 1:58 (29-24)
113- Viarengo (WCR) dec. A. Luke, 4-0 (32-24)
120- Baldesari (WCR) pinned M. DiBernardo, 2:53 (32-24)
