High School Wrestling: NA rallies to get rare shot at title
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North Allegheny wrestling coach Jamie Kyriazis remembers the previous time North Allegheny made it to the finals of the WPIAL team tournament.
"It was 1990, my senior year," said Kyriazis after watching the Tigers rally from a 19-0 deficit to upset Connellsville, 29-28, in the WPIAL Class AAA semifinals Friday at Ringgold High School.
"It's been a long time, but it was worth the wait."
Wednesday, North Allegheny (17-3), seeded No. 7 in the 20-team bracket, upset No. 2 seed Kiski Area, 36-30. Connellsville (15-4), the No. 3 seed, won the first five bouts Friday to take a commanding, 19-0 lead and make another upset highly unlikely.
"I knew when they drew 132 [pounds] for the first bout that we were in trouble," said Kyriazis, referring to the fact that North Allegheny is weak in the middle weights, where Connellsville was strong.
"We had our better kids in the upper and lower weight classes, but I didn't know if we had enough to come back from such a big deficit. It was an incredible performance."
A pin by Jarred Lux at 182, a major decision by Zach Smith at 195 and a pin by Dom Forys at 113 allowed North Allegheny to tie the match, 25-25.
Connellsville regained the lead with a decision by Ryan Burkholder at 120. North Allegheny's Mike Wanner clinched the victory with a 10-1 major decision of Tyrone Brown at 126.
North Allegheny will face unbeaten and top-seeded Canon-McMillan (21-0) in the title match at 6:30 p.m. today at Chartiers Valley High School.
The two-time defending champion Big Macs earned their third consecutive title berth with a 52-9 rout against fifth-seeded Greensburg Salem (11-4).
Burrell earned its 10th consecutive title berth with a 33-28 upset of Chartiers-Houston in the semifinals, also at Ringgold.
Burrell (14-8) has won five consecutive WPIAL Class AA titles but was seeded No. 3. Chartiers-Houston (16-6), the 2011 runner-up, was seeded No. 2.
Burrell's victory was made possible by overtime victories for Jason Roberts (103), Corey Falleroni (145) and Kevin Best (152) -- all by takedowns.
Burrell will face top seed Jefferson-Morgan (15-1) in the championship match at 4 p.m. today at Chartiers Valley.
The Rockets earned their first title berth since 1995 with a 49-21 win against No. 4 seed Bentworth (15-5).
First Published February 4, 2012 12:06 am
