By Ryan Mink
rmink@digitalsports.com
O’Connell wrestling Coach Bill Carpenter won a WCAC championship his first year of coaching.
“I figured, ‘Well, this is going to be a piece of cake,’” Carpenter said.
After 28 years and 23 straight WCAC DeMatha conference tournament championships, Carpenter has certainly come to realize that it’s no piece of cake.
“And today, true to form, it was not a piece of cake,” Carpenter said Saturday.
O’Connell ended DeMatha’s domination of the WCAC conference that lasted nearly a quarter-century Saturday evening behind four individual champions and a 180.5 team score, just 4.5 points more than the Stags.
The Knights led by 18 points before the Stags stormed back. The tournament came down to the final bout at heavyweight between Paul VI’s Dan McGroarty and DeMatha’s Miguel Azucena, with the entire O’Connell squad relegated to cheering from the sideline.
“It’s the first time we cheered for PVI, cause …” Knights 130-pounder Nam Dunbar said, alluding to O’Connell’s rivalry with its Virginia conference foe.
The Stags needed a major decision in the bout to win, but McGroarty – a first-year wrestler – pulled out a 5-2 decision to seal O’Connell’s tournament title.
Paul VI fans, O’Connell fans and otherwise exploded in cheers, as if nearly the entire gym was ready to see somebody else take the crown this season. The O’Connell wrestlers flocked to McGroarty and Carpenter came to him, shook his hand and said he will be his favorite Paul VI student athlete for all time.
“I think everybody in the whole school was cheering for me,” McGroarty said. “They’ve had it 23 years. I think it’s time to change it a little bit.”
O’Connell had finished second to DeMatha too many times for Carpenter to count. But O’Connell is laden with senior experience, motivated to win in its coaches final season and was convinced that it could pull off the upset after beating the Stags in a dual meet.
“I’ve been looking forward to this since freshmen year when I found out how many times they had won it,” Dunbar said. “Ever since, I wanted to win this so bad. Everybody has.”
“I’ve been wanting to win this since I was born,” 135-pounder Jonathan Carpenter added. “My dad’s the coach. I’ve been watching DeMatha win every year and it’s nice to know we’re the best team.”
O’Connell entered the finals with a 6 ½ point lead and had eight wrestlers in the finals compared to DeMatha’s seven. The two teams had head-to-head matchups in five matches.
The Knights got their first big win at 119-pounds from Kyle Mason, who took down DeMatha’s Pat Prada, who bumped up a weight class despite feeling sick all week. Mason pulled out a 9-5 victory.
O’Connell 125-pounder James Young then eeked out a 7-5 win over Jonathan Simmons, then Carpenter beat the Stags’ Kyle Hayden at 135 pounds to give the Knights an 18-point lead.
But then, with DeMatha’s Chris Miller losing 8-3 to O’Connell’s Chris Curtin, the Stag senior tossed Curtin on his bag and pinned him. It was Miller’s first-ever finals appearance in any tournament.
“I wanted to do a leaping hug but I didn’t know if that was too cliché,” Miller said. “I went from winning my match, feeling great and everyone congratulating me to now just feeling terrible.”
Miller’s win electrified the Stags, who then cheered Paul VI’s Ben Pfotenhauer to a 3-2 decision over O’Connell’s Conor Furey, then got a huge pin from Daniel Singh at 189 pounds.
Ben Hatef pinned O’Connell’s Christian Straubs at 215 pounds in just 1 minute, 28 seconds, setting up the Stags for a chance to win.
“Let’s go Dan!” Young said of O’Connell’s feelings at the time.
Besides the Knights’ individual champions, O’Connell got big third-place finishes from 152-pounder Andrew Nguyen, who had never placed before at a tournament, and first-year wrestler Luke Milligan at 189.
“It’s the way to go out,” said Carpenter, who confirmed he plans to hang up his coaching shoes after this season. “For us, this is as sweet as it gets.”
McNAMARA’S BANNISTER IS OUTSTANDING
Bishop McNamara senior 130-pounder Andrew Bannister has won numerous tournament titles. He’s a three-time Maryland private schools champion and can’t even recall all of his other tournament bracket sheets.
It’s the level of competition that Bannister sees that makes a tournament memorable. Bannister faced off against his rival, Bishop O’Connell’s Nam Dunbar, in Saturday’s finals and won 11-6. He was later named the tournament’s Outstanding Wrestler.
It’s vindication for Bannister, who lost in the semifinals of last year’s WCAC tournament after bumping up a weight class. Then, there were some who thought Bannister was trying to avoid Dunbar.
But after beating Dunbar for the third time in his career, Bannister has further proven that he is the victor of the match-up between two of the area’s most talented wrestlers.
“It kind of solidified my accomplishments,” Bannister said. “I was feeling real nervous going in and I’m pretty sure he was feeling the same way. With me and him it can go either way.”
Just as in their last match-up, Dunbar went up 4-1 early in the match. After an escape, Bannister got a takedown with eight seconds left in the second period. The pair then knotted the score at 6 with 50 seconds left before Bannister got a takedown with 23 seconds left and rolled Dunbar to his back.
McNamara also had the 103-pound champion in Aaron Jackson, who like Bannister has suffered just two losses this season.
“It’s a lot of hard work, wrestling with Andrew every day,” Jackson said. “I’m trying to come behind Andrew Bannister, a three-time state champ and all that. I’ll try something.”
O’NEILL GETS HIS SECOND TITLE
Gonzaga sophomore Paul O’Neill notched his second WCAC title with a 7-3 win over Good Counsel’s Shane Arechiga at 112 pounds. The match was one of the elite match-ups of the tournament.
“It’s no different from the first, but it feels good to get the win,” O’Neill said. “I knew I was going to have to wrestle hard. Shane’s a real good wrestler. I’ll celebrate after the season but right now I’m just trying to stay focused.”
Gonzaga also got third-place finishes from Zak Thompson at 119 pounds and Stephane Guilou at 125.
WENZLAFF BOOSTS CADETS
St. John’s 160-pounder James Wenzlaff had beaten Paul VI’s Matt Carlstrom already this season but he couldn’t help but be a little nervous taking the mat Saturday. That’s because Wenzlaff knew that St. John’s wrestling really wanted his win.
Wenzlaff defeated Carlstrom, 9-2, becoming the first Cadet to win a WCAC championship in the past four years.
“I was a little shaky,” Wenzlaff said, admitting the history at first made him nervous but then boosted him later. “Towards the end when I started wrestling it helped me.”
PAUL VI IS ALSO STRONG
The Panthers did more than just help O’Connell win the title. Paul VI had quite a strong showing with three champions out of four finalists.
Ben Pfotenhauer won a 3-2 decision over O’Connell’s Conor Furey, Charles Bull beat Ireton’s TJ McLaughlin, 8-0, and McGroarty notched perhaps the most dramatic win of all.
McGroarty found his chances at winning a title because Good Counsel heavyweight Devin Gordon-Hamm was still on a football recruiting trip at Pittsburgh and St. John’s heavyweight Kevin McReynolds was also not participating Saturday.
TEAM STANDINGS
1. O’Connell – 180.5
2. DeMatha – 176
3. Paul VI – 130
4. Good Counsel – 87
5. McNamara – 84.5
6. Ireton – 76.5
7. Gonzaga – 59
8. St. Mary’s Ryken – 55
9. St. John’s – 24
CHAMPIONSHIP RESULTS
103- Aaron Jackson (MCN) maj.dec, 13-4 over Elliot Mondragon (BI)
112- Paul O’Neill (ZAG) dec, 7-3 over Shane Arechiga (GC)
119- Kyle Mason (DJO) dec, 9-5 over Pat Prada (DEM)
125- James Young (DJO) dec, 7-5 over Jonathan Simmons (DEM)
130- Andrew Bannister (MCN) dec, 11-6 over Nam Dunbar
135- Jonathan Carpenter (DJO) dec, 10-4 over Kyle Hayden (DEM)
140- Christopher Miller (DEM) pin, 3:20 over Chris Curtin (DJO)
145- Ben Pfotenhauer (PVI) dec, 3-2 over Conor Furey (DJO)
152- Charles Bull (PVI) dec, 8-0 over TJ McLaughlin (BI)
160- James Wenzlaff (SJC) dec, 9-2 over Matt Carlstrom (PVI)
171- Mitch Brown (DJO) dec, 4-41 over Mark Rodriguez (BI)
189- Daniel Singh (DEM) pin, 2:21 over Andrew Lutterloh (BI)
215- Ben Hatef (DEM) pin, 1:28 over Christian Straubs (DJO)
275- Dan McGroarty (PVI) dec, 5-2 over Miguel Azucena (DEM)
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