This week's notebook highlights PW's Justin Staudenmayer as well as the elimination of districts in 2013.
By Alex Frazier
Meet…Justin Staudenmayer
Younger brothers face a tough road following their successful older siblings.
Plymouth Whitemarsh’s John Michael Staudenmayer placed third in the state as a junior and won the 171-pound title as a senior.
Now in his junior year, it’s all of a sudden crunch time for younger brother Justin.
As a sophomore last year, he was one match away from placing at states, exactly what John Michael had done as a sophomore.
So if Justin follows the script, he should finish on the third step of the podium this year.
“Hopefully, we have Justin on the same track,” said PW coach Nate Wachter.
Of course, Staudenmayer wouldn’t settle for that. Every younger brother has that added motivation of outperforming his sibling.
Staudenmayer is off to a strong start this year.
He has just two losses, both to prominent opponents. Both losses came at the Beast of the East. His first setback was to eventual champion Dylan Milonas of Blair. Milonas, who is ranked ninth nationally by InterMat, defeated him 4-0.
His second loss denied him a medal. St. Christopher’s’ Robert Janis sneaked by him 3-1 with a takedown in overtime.
“Throughout the whole match he was definitely pushing the pace,” said Staudenmayer. “He was taking shots and I was defending them.”
Since then he has yet to lose. In fact, in the finals of the Governor Mifflin Tournament, he defeated Nate Williams of Dover 7-1. Williams had beaten him 2-0 as a freshman.
“He’s looking good,” said Wachter. “He’s been looking good on top and has really good head position on his feet.”
“So far so good,” said Staudenmayer. “I’m just trying to keep moving forward, keep getting better every day at practice.”
Staudenmayer hasn’t dwelled on his losses except to learn from them.
“I’ve been learning from the two losses I had and even from some of the wins I’ve had,” he said. “As long as I’m picking up something from every single match, then I’ll keep moving forward.”
Because Staudenmayer has no peers in the wrestling room to give him a good workout, Wachter has made sure there are plenty of coaches available to push him.
Staudenmayer regularly works with Wachter, a four-time NCAA qualifier from Penn State; PW alum Justin Giovinco, a two-time Pa. state champ; Lewis Baker, who wrestled at Drexel and trained at the Greco-Roman training center in Michigan; and Dom Sabia, another PW alumnus who wrestled at Kutztown.
“Our coaching staff is very good with a lot of background,” said Staudenmayer. “They’re there every day pushing me to the point where I want to run out of the room. They push me so hard every day and I appreciate that. It definitely helps me out. I go out and wrestle the kids and they’re not as good as the coaches.”
In his three years on the varsity, Staudenmayer has steadily grown in size. After starting at 112 as a freshman, he blossomed into a 125-pounder as a sophomore, and this year has grown again to 145.
“The first couple of matches it was somewhat tough to adjust,” he said. “All the coaches I wrestle with are all big, so they’ve done a good job preparing me for the weight change and strength.”
Staudenmayer quit football two years ago to focus on wrestling. He played baseball as a freshman and sophomore but is undecided whether he will play again this year.
Even though college is another two years off, Staudenmayer has been considering where he might go. Since John Michael is a redshirt freshman at the University of North Carolina, UNC is high on his list.
“That’s definitely a possibility,” he said. “That would be pretty cool.”
Last year Staudenmayer won sections and districts but had to settle for a second at regionals. This year he would like to run the table en route to a podium finish at states.
“The higher up the better,” he said.
One of his good friends might have something to say about that. LaSalle’s Matt Cimato finished second at regionals last year at 140 and went on to place third in the state. He is currently ranked 10thnationally by InterMat.
“He’s very good,” said Staudenmayer. “We’ve never wrestled. I’ve always been much lighter.”
Bye bye sectionals –Sectional tournaments will be eliminated for the 2013 season. For quite a while now, the PIAA has been losing money on the sectional tournaments, which haven’t drawn large crowds.
The thinking is that by going to league tournaments as an alternative, more interest will be generated.
“I like it,” said Hatboro-Horsham coach Glenn Kaiser, who has been a member of the District One Committee for 15 years. “Speaking from a Section Three standpoint, our section has not generated fans or a whole lot of rivalries. We don’t wrestle those teams any more. When you have a league championship, you’re going to fill the stands and you have a real league championship.”
For the Suburban One League, that would mean three separate tournaments for the National, Continental and American Conferences. The first two would get four district qualifiers for each weight class, while the American would get three.
In the current arrangement, Cheltenham and Upper Moreland are grouped in the tough Section One, which are all National Conference teams. Now they will be able to compete in their own league.
In the current Section Two, SOL teams compete against three PAC-10 teams—Upper Perkiomen, Phoenixville and Pottsgrove. In the new league arrangement, Hatboro-Horsham will join the three Central Bucks teams in addition to Quakertown, Souderton, Pennridge and North Penn in what a long time ago was the old Bux-Mont League.
The current Section Three will become the American Conference tournament. Before, it also included a mish-mash of leagues with Hatboro-Horsham, Methacton, Radnor, Lower Merion, Harriton and Perkiomen Valley.
“The Suburban One League has been the driving force behind it,” said Kaiser. “Once it was proposed, the coaches on the committee were very proactive going to the athletic directors in charge of wrestling in the SOL. We all agreed it’s not a bad thing.”
Still to be decided is whether there will be two district tournaments or three.
“We need to fine tune exactly how many qualifiers each league will get,” said Kaiser.
Some coaches think the ideal would be a super-district tournament with all the SOL teams competing as a district with qualifiers going straight to regionals. That way there would be true SOL champions, not just conference champions.
It would also eliminate two wrestlers having to compete against each other for three weeks in a row, which happens quite often.
By eliminating a sectional-type tournament and making the league tournament a regional qualifier, teams can then find non-local competition and broaden their experience.
“No one wants to do super districts,” said Kaiser. “We would love to do super districts, wrestle all our guys once and go direct to regionals. That’s exactly what we would want. That’s what we’ve been begging for. Why should we have to bang each other at sectionals, districts and regionals to get to states? Let’s just go to districts, get it over with, go to regionals and we’re done.”
What a great idea!
District Duals – There were few surprises at Thursday’s opening rounds of the District One Dual Meet Tournament. In only two instances did lower seeded teams advance. Both involved SOL teams.
The biggest upset came when No. 11 Pennsbury, which almost tripped up against Wissahickon in the first round, came back to upend No. 6 Upper Perkiomen, 48-22. The Tribe did forfeit two matches, but Pennsbury’s middleweights came up big. The Falcons racked up five pins and gave up only two.
No. 14 Central Bucks East was on the other end of an upset as the Patriots lost to No. 19 Garnet Valley 45-27. East managed just five wins—three by fall, one by forfeit and one by decision.
Four SOL teams remain alive in the hunt for one of the four state-qualifying spots. The quarterfinals will be held at Upper Dublin High School next Friday at 6 p.m. with one round of consolations starting at 8 p.m.
No. 8 Council Rock South will face No. 1 Owen J. Roberts. No. 11 Pennsbury will take on No. 3 Spring-Ford, and No. 2 Norristown will contend with No. 7 Council Rock North.
SOL Top 5
1. Norristown
2. Council Rock North
3. Council Rock South
4. Central Bucks South
5. Pennsbury
Top Guns
106—Scott Parker, Pennridge
113— Billy Rappo, Council Rock South
120—Kolton Veit, Souderton
126—Josh DiSanto, Pennsbury
132—John Dutrow, Council Rock North
138—Mike Springer, Norristown
145—Justin Staudenmayer, Plymouth Whitemarsh
152—Seth Ehlo, Central Bucks West
160—Brett Harner, Norristown
170—Shane Springer, Norristown
182—Larry Gordon, Norristown
195—PJ Steinmetz, Council Rock South
220—Tim Riley, Council Rock South
285—Andrew Van Buskirk, William Tennent
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