Wrestling

Aggies Dominate Competition, Capture York College Invitational Title

YORK (PA) - Delaware Valley College crowned four individual champions and showed why it's the sixth-ranked team in Division III as the Aggies ran away from the 11-team field that included three other ranked squads and took top honors at the York College Spartan Invitational.

Delaware Valley registered 157 points and nearly doubled the scoring output of tournament runner-up and eighth-ranked The College of New Jersey (79 points). Division II Liberty University placed third with 59 points while 17th-ranked York (57.5 points) and Elizabethtown College (54 points) rounded out the top five. The tournament field also featured No. 29 Centenary College, which placed ninth with 32 points.

Nine of the 20 Aggie wrestlers that competed at the invitational placed in the top four including individual champions Jesse Harrington (149), Mike Wilcox (184), Joe West (197) and Kyle Bilquist (Hwt). Chris Sheetz (125), Dan Hall (149) and Ryan Herwig (157) each placed second while Brandon Clemmer and Tramaine Franklin took third and fourth respectively at 133 pounds.

Harrington, seeded second, reached the finals with a 7-4 victory over Bill Tenpenny (College of New Jersey), a 24-8 technical fall over Mike Montgomery (Centenary) and a 4-1 triumph over Leo Dormann (Stevens Tech). In the finals, Harrington was scheduled to face Hall, a teammate , who was wrestling up a weight class from his normal 141 where he is ranked seventh in Division III. Hall forfeited the match to Harrington, giving the freshman the title.

Wilcox, a junior transfer from Gloucester, was seeded first in his weight class and he pinned his first two opponents in a combined 1:20. He first dropped Alex Cressley of Washington in 64 seconds and needed just 16 seconds to turn Joe Bozzomo of The College of New Jersey on his back. In the finals, Wilcox posted a 9-5 decision over Thad Lloyd of The Apprentice School.

West was the top seed at 197 and the sophomore pinned two of his three opponents to win the crown. He opened with an 8-6 decision over Nick Stratis of Gloucester County and then pinned Deron Sharp of Elizabethtown with just 11 seconds left in the second period (4:49). In the finals, West dropped Hank Conklin of York with seconds to go in the opening period (2:54).

Bilquist, ranked eighth in Division III in his weight class, reached the finals with 3-2 and 4-0 victories over James Roarty of Stevens Tech and Tim Katzaman of Elizabethtown. The top seed then earned a 6-2 decision over second-seeded and ninth-ranked Luke Panizzi of York for the title.

Sheetz, a freshman, pinned two of his three opponents to reach the 125-pound finals. However, he was pinned by seventh-ranked Kyle Flickinger of York and settled for second. Hall, a three-time national qualifier, reached the championship round at 149 with a big 8-3 victory over fourth-ranked Tyler Branham of The College of New Jersey in the semifinals. Herwig, a two-time national qualifier and the fifth-ranked wrestler at 157, won a trio of matches before suffering an 8-4 loss to No. 7 John Niedrich of York in the finals.

Both Clemmer and Franklin reached the 133-pound semifinals before falling into the consolation brackets. The two then met in the consolation finals and Clemmer pinned Franklin in 2:45 to take third.