ALTOONA — Eight Clearfield Bisons will be heading to the Altoona Area High School Field House on Friday evening in hopes of placing in the top three in their weight class so that they can advance to the PIAA State Championships in Hershey.
Action gets under way at 5:00 p.m. with Preliminary action, which then will be followed at approximately 7:15 with the quarterfinals. The field of 12 will be whittled to eight after the first round of consolations which are set to begin around 9:15.
Saturday’s championship semifinals and round 2 consolations begin at noon. The third round of consies will immediately follow at around 2:30 p.m.
The all-important consolation finals to determine the final spot for Hershey will be at 5:30, followed by the Parade of Champions at 6:15.
The Championship Finals are slated for 6:30 Saturday night.
Competing for Clearfield will be district  champions Christian Stone (120) and Dylan Graham (126) , district runners-up Noah Cline (106), Nolan Barger (145), and Jordan Lancaster (285), and district third place finishers Jake Lancaster (138), Kody Hepfer (160), and Devin Sinclair (195).
Stone was the regional champ at 103 in 2010 as a freshman, then placed third at 112 last year for two trips to Hershey in two tries.
Barger has also been to Hershey twice with a third in 2010 at 125 and a runner-up finish last year at 130.
Freshman Cline (11-14) will face off against sophomore Damian Huff (22-7) of Hollidaysburg, the District 6 fourth place finisher.
Stone (24-5), a junior, will face the winner of the Slappy Isiah (10-5) – Deane Twitchell (24-10) bout.
Graham (21-10), also a junior, will await the winner of the Beau Colletta (13-6) – Caleb Shively (13-12) match up.
Freshman Jake Lancaster (6-8) has Ian Helsel (21-9) of Westmont Hilltop to contend with in his first match.
Junior Barger (26-4) will tangle with Mifflin County’s Joe Knarr (28-10) in his preliminary bout.
Hepfer (6-18), a senior, will meet Jimmy Paulsen (29-12) of Erie McDowell in round one.
Sophomore Sinclair (2-19) has Mike Betz (5-3) of Carrick, while senior Jordan Lancaster (13-16) has Nate Carlin (22-11) of Erie Prep.
The complete brackets can be found here: http://www.pawrsl.com/pa/2012_nw_regional_pairings3a.htm.
