HYDE — Three Curwensville Area High School wrestlers remained in the hunt for District 9 Class AA Tournament gold medals with a combined five wins during the long first session in Clearfield Area High School’s Bison Gym Friday.
Returning champion and No. 1- seeded 152-pounder Shae Bloom (27-1) was on the mats for only two minutes in breezing through the first two rounds with falls, while unseeded Steven McClure (4-2) registered two contrasting victories at 220 and No. 2 seed Blake Passarelli (24-6) made his debut with a shutout.
Four Golden Tide matmen will have to navigate two consolation rounds Saturday to place third or fourth and earn a trip to Sharon next weekend for the Northwest Region tourney.
Ben Junod, who was seeded fourth at 170, bounced back from an overtime setback in the quarterfinals with a come-from-behind effort to remain alive along with Seth Woolcock at 120, Dylan Myers at 126 and Eli Jacobs at 160.
“Our expectations were we’d have four in the semis, but Ben just didn’t wrestle like Ben against the (Isaac) Wright kid from Coudersport,” Curwensville coach Dean Swatsworth said. “He did at the end of his next match.”
The near-capacity crowd didn’t get to witness any real shockers with top two seeds racking up 30 falls, one technical fall, two major decisions and seven regular decisions.
A trio of No. 3 seeds did get bumped off, and Junod was one of seven No. 4 seeds to fall.
Of the 11 returning or former champs, only third-seeded Brookville heavyweight Bryce Town failed to move along as he lost 3-1 in overtime to Ridgway’s Colton McClain, seeded sixth despite owning a 24-5 record. Town was the 220 champ in 2014 and runner-up at that weight last year.
Bloom, two wins away from becoming a four-time district titlist, was all business in cradling Brockway’s Bryce Grecco in 34 seconds and switched from a cradle to a front headlock to pin Ridgway’s Jonathan Francis in 1:26.
He will get No. 5 seed Dylan Baumgardner (21-7) in the semis, with No. 2 seed Caleb Hetrick (25-7) and No. 3 seed Gage Arnold (25-5) squaring off in the other half of the bracket.
Passarelli drew a preliminary round bye after the bantam weight was restructured because of two no-shows, and had to work for his 4-0 win over No. 7 seed Dylan Pesock of Oswayo Valley. An early takedown was critical, for the Golden Tide freshman couldn’t add to the lead until receiving a penalty point for interlocking with 1:28 left. Pesock then turned him loose in hopes of pulling off a big move.
No. 3 seed Kyle Bush (23-6) is next for Passarelli, while No. 1 seed Keelan Kunselman (23-10) will go against No. 5 seed Reese Vollmer (17-11) in the other semifinal bout.
McClure, the only semifinalist who was not seeded, surrendered the opening takedown to No. 5 seed Josh Miller of Keystone but was leading 7-2 when he ran a half-nelson for the turnover and then engineered a fall at 4:27 in the prelims.
His quarterfinal bout with No. 4 seed R.J. Fattler of Cranberry was much, much tougher. They traded escapes in regulation, and Fattler went up 3-1 on a penalty point for interlocking and an escape in the second tie-breaker period. McClure refused to be denied and bearhugged Fattler for a tying takedown with just three seconds on the clock and then rode him in the next 30-second period for a 4-3 victory.
Looming ahead is No. 1 seed and defending champ Ethan Budd (25-2) of Port Allegany. The other semi pits No. 2 Tyler Cook (26-8) of Brookville against No. 3 Patrick Crawford (9-4) of Redbank Valley.
Junod squeezed past Cranberry’s Jess York 1-0 via an escape early in the third period and managed only an escape in a 3-1 overtime loss to No. 5 seed Isaac Wright of Coudersport.
Chances of extending his season weren’t looking good for the Golden Tide senior when No. 8 seed Camden Rothrauff of Kane took him down in the first period of their consy second round duel and then put him on his back midway through the second period for a 5-2 lead. An interlocking point and an escape in the final five seconds got Junod close, and he turned Rothrauff once for two tying points in the third period before decking him at the 4:22 mark.
Woolcock and Myers bounced back from pins by high seeds to match consy wins, the former besting Cranberry’s Caleb Wry 4-0 and the latter cradling Johnsonburg’s Chris Kennedy in 35 seconds.
Jacobs was a fall victim of undefeated Paul Zacherl of Cranberry and received a bye into the consy quarterfinals that will get under way along with the championship semifinals at 10 o’clock Saturday morning. The consy semifinals will follow.
The final session is set for 3 p.m. with the District 9 Coaches Association Hall of Fame inductions and the Parade of Champions to precede the championship and consolation final matches.
With all 14 wrestlers alive, including 10 in the championship semis, No. 1 ranked Brookville already is in a runaway mode for its third title in a row with 76.5 points.
Ridgway and Brockway already are far back in second place with 48.5 points with Coudersport (46) and Coudersport (46) rounding out the top five.
Curwensville is in 10th place with 30 points as the 11 Golden Tide wrestlers were 11-11.
Seniors Hunter Lancaster (0-2 at 182), Jeff Harvey (0-2 at 195) and James Lee (1-2 at 285) had their careers end in the consy second round.
Junior 145-punder Mason Lancaster also was 0-2.
To view the complete brackets, courtesy Flowrestling, click here.