No. 7 Indians take out Rams

by Dennis Weller, Special to The Mercury

Posted on January 23, 2009

RED HILL -- The Upper Perkiomen wrestlers wanted to do well in their own gym during Thursday's opening night of the District 1-AAA Duals Tournament. They also wanted to make sure they upheld their No. 7 seed by advancing to the quarterfinals.

The Indians accomplished that task by coming out and wrestling aggressively from the start as they eliminated Pioneer Athletic Conference rival Spring-Ford, 47-14.

Upper Perk (15-7) jumped to a 14-0 lead on the strength of two major decisions and a pin in the first three bouts. The Indians will move on to Council Rock South for a quarterfinal match next Friday night at 6:00. Spring-Ford (9-4), the 10th seed, had beaten 23rd-seeded Garnet Valley by a 38-26 score earlier in the night to earn its shot at the hosts.

"It's pretty cool being in our own gym," said Upper Perk coach Tom Hontz. "You have a little sense of pride being the seventh seed. We wanted to get in the top eight and advance to next week and see how high we can finish in the district."

"We've been pushing it really hard," said Indian senior Jared Bennett. "It's late in the season and everybody's starting to click. That's what you get when you work hard."

Britt Kerr got the Indians off to a good start with a 15-4 win at 160 pounds and Nick Edmunson followed with a 12-3 decision. Then Nick Hale picked up a first-period pin and the Indians were off to a 14-0 lead.

Aaron Cummins got the Rams on the board with a 3-0 win, bringing on a battle of senior heavyweights between Bennett and the Rams' Justin Franiak.

Bennett pulled off a takedown in the first period – the only one of the bout – and went on to a 4-3 win to raise his record to 26-2 on the season.

"He's a good wrestler," Bennett said of Franiak, who dropped to 19-8 for the year. "I've wrestled him for years. He always gives me a good match."

"The same as last year (a 3-0 win for Bennett)," said Hontz. "Franiac's such a big boy. He's hard to move around. But Jared wrestled a smart match and got the win."

The Indians slowly stretched their lead, though it wasn't easy. They picked up a couple of third-period pins along the way and a decision in overtime by Marty McStravick.

"We were pretty fortunate to come out and win, especially by that score," said Hontz, whose team will take on the Rams again in a league match in about two weeks. "There were a lot of close matches. I'm not really looking forward to having to wrestle them again in two weeks."

"They wrestled a good solid match," said Ram coach Tim Seislove. "I'm a little disappointed we lost some close ones in there. We wrestle again in two weeks and we'll see if we can close the gap a little bit."

Spring-Ford had advanced to the match with the Indians by taking some close decisions against Garnet Valley (8-5). The Rams trailed by a 23-17 score midway through, but Jason Dombrosky won a wild 17-11 bout at 112 pounds, Tom Boring followed with a tough 5-0 decision, and Ricky Gorrell put Spring-Ford on top with a 15-2 nod.

Then Tim Miller escaped with 20 seconds left against Zack Nickle for a 3-2 verdict, and Sean Herron broke open a close match in the third period for a 6-0 win and a 33-23 Ram margin.

"Against Garnet Valley, the kids stepped up and we won some close ones," said Seislove. "It was a good win."

That was especially true since Spring-Ford was coming off a tough league loss against Owen J. Roberts the night before.

"The Garnet Valley win showed some good character," Seislove added.

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