Bison Send Six to North West AAA Regional, Crown One D4/9 Champ

CLEARFIELD — Eleven Bison wrestlers competed at the District 4/9 AAA Championships on Saturday inside the Arthur J. Weis Gymnasium, and six placed in the top-2 to advance to next week’s North West Regional Tournament at Altoona High School.

Junior 215 pounder Mark McGonigal earned his second district title, the first coming two years ago, while teammates Evan Davis at 106, Luke Freeland at 138, Karson Kline at 145, Carter Chamberlain at 172, and Oliver Billotte at 285 claimed runner-up status to advance as well. All are underclassmen.

The Bison finished second in the team race, edging Selinsgrove by three points, to District 4’s Williamsport 177.5 to 152. Williamsport had six individual champions and will advance seven wrestlers to Altoona.

McGonigal (17-3) had an easy go of it by getting a first period fall in his semifinal match and beating Selinsgrove’s Ryan Aument (20-6) 8-0 in the finals.

Out of the five Bison that placed second, three had to win a “true second” bout after the completion of the championship finals.

Sophomore Davis (15-7) had first period falls in the quarterfinals, semifinals and in his true second match. He lost to Williamsport’s undefeated Cael Nasdeo (14-0) by tech fall in the finals however.

At 145, Kline (16-5) won 4-2 in his first match, but aggravated an practice injury from earlier in the week and injury defaulted in the finals to Williamsport’s Riley Bower, who remained undefeated on the season while picking up his third District 4/9 title. The junior the went on to a 3-0 win over Garrett Paradise (21-13) in his true second place bout.

Chamberlain (13-8), just a freshman, made his first post-season a tourney a success by going 3-1 and getting a pin in his true second final.

Fellow juniors Freeland and Billotte lost in the finals, but had defeated the third place finisher earlier in the tourney, so didn’t have to do the extra match to advance.

At 138, Freeland (6-6) won by a major in the semis but was tech falled by DuBois’ Chandler Ho in the finals. Ho won his second title, along with two runner-up finishes in his career, and finished eighth at the PIAA state championships last season.

Billotte (18-2) ran into a buzzsaw in his finals match in the form of 4-time district champion Nate Schon (32-0) of Selinsgrove. Schon was up 7-1 in the second period when he picked up a fall. The Iowa State recruit, 137-6 overall in his career, will be looking for his second state title in March.

Falling one spot short of advancement to the regional tourney were juniors Nolan Barr (17-4) at 126 and Hayden Kovalick (15-4), who both placed third. Barr lost in overtime in the semis and Kovalick was pinned in the finals and true second match while in close 7-6 and 6-4 hotly contested bouts.

At 160, junior Wyatt Reorda (10-12) went 2-2 and placed fourth.

Freshman Will Domico (10-11) went 1-2 at 152 and the lone senior in the line-up, Justin Hand, weny 0-2 at 132.

Pictures from the District 4/9 AAA tourney and the District AA tourney can be found HERE, courtesy of Alise Barr.

Ten out of the 13 top seeds went on to win crowns. The complete bracket results, courtesy PA_wrestling.com can be found HERE.

Finals Matchups/Results: