Clearfield
vs
Bald Eagle Area
12/20/01
@ Clearfield

District IX

Eagles rally from early deficit to beat Clearfield
By Ron Bracken
rbracken@centredaily.com

HYDE -- As Bald Eagle Area's Dick Rhoades makes his farewell tour around the Central Wrestling Conference it has become customary for the host school to honor him with gifts prior to the start of the dual meet.

Thursday night, Clearfield presented Rhoades with a Clearfield wrestling T-shirt and a clock as well and gave a bouquet of flowers to his wife, Carol.

The Bison also gave him a scare as they bolted to a 15-3 lead after the first four bouts before the Eagle wrestlers recovered and went on to post a 36-21 victory -- their fourth in five meets.

"I would have been even more nervous if we had lost at 130," said a relieved Rhoades afterward. "That was a real turning point in the meet. We knew Teddy Adams was tough and we had to find a way to scratch out a win."

Mark Fisher found it, recovering from a 3-0 deficit by headlocking the un-beaten Adams for a takedown and three back points near the end of the second period and tacking on two more takedowns in the final two minutes for a 10-5 win. That started BEA on a six-bout run that saw the Eagles on top 27-15 when it ended.

"Mark had been wrestling tough for us all year but he had a bad weekend at the Beast of the East," Rhoades said. "We thought he could place there. But tonight he wrestled the way he had been wrestling. That was an important win at the time because Clearfield had some momentum going and they would have been hard to stop."

Brad Pataky lit the fire for the Bison, pinning Tyler Skripek in 1:55 at 103.

BEA's Clint Shirk shut out Junior Lonjin, 6-0, with two takedowns and a reversal to slow the Bison momentarily. But Todd Bloom reeled in Eryn Wagner, 10-7, after spotting him a quick 5-0 lead at 119 and Zac Wagner decked Tyler Parsons in 1:19 to make it 15-3.

"I expected we could win those matches but I didn't know if we could get the falls," said Bison coach Jeff Aveni, whose squad dropped to 2-1. "Bloom did a nice job, coming back from being behind 5-0, and we thought Zac could get us a pin.

"We were in pretty good shape there. But we had one loss of concentration (at 130) and it seemed like the whole team's concentration broke there. At 135 we were in it but you could see during the bout that the intensity wasn't there."

BEA's Scott Maney and Clearfield's Luke Durant were scoreless at the end of regulation at 135 but in overtime, Maney took Durant down to his back for a 4-0 win.

The Eagles followed that with a 5-4 decision by Jordan Wagner over Ryan Graham. Wagner took a 5-3 lead with an escape and takedown in the second period before Graham got out near the end of the period to make it 5-4. Wagner rode Graham the entire third period for the win that closed the gap to 15-12.

"Jordan needed that," Rhoades said. "He's been struggling. He goes where (Brandon) Guenot and (Eric) Fisher don't. He's wrestled everywhere from 140 to 152. But he won some key matches for us last year and there's no reason he can't do that this year."

Guenot and Fisher racked up first-period falls over Scott Hall and Nathan Shadeck, respectively, to propel BEA to a 24-15 lead and Jon Bucha rolled over Matt Meckey, 11-5 at 160, scoring on a pair of takedowns and a two-point near fall in the first period and adding an escape and takedown in the second to go in front, 9-4.

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