A winter scholastic season for all to remember
Lakewood High School’s Adam Fackley was a solid performer for the Ranger wrestling team during the winter season of 2010-2011.
The calendar may say spring, but Mother Nature certainly has a ways to go before convincing anyone that warm weather will soon be something for all to enjoy on a consistent basis.
What the latter part of March and the beginning of April should remind everyone of is the fact that another fantastic winter scholastic sports season has come and gone.
Once again, there were many exceptionally inspiring performances from a large group of student-athletes.
This week, the focus will be on those who gave quite a few spectators something to watch and talk about in the days to come regarding the winter sports of wrestling, swimming and gymnastics.
And as will always be the case, space just doesn’t permit the opportunity to highlight every team and every individual, but the effort will be made to give extra and additional recognition to those who gave it their all in the pursuit of excellence on the mat, in the pool and inside the gymnastics arena.
In wrestling, what a year all grappling fans witnessed, while the culmination to another great season was again on display at Value City Arena inside the Jerome Schottenstein Center on the campus of Ohio State University.
After the final match had taken place on the last day of competition, a familiar site was seen by all with St. Edward High School regaining the state championship, and bringing back to the school its 26th Division I wrestling crown.
The Eagles sent 10 wrestlers to the state competition with three individual state champions, and enough points to easily stay atop the leader board ahead of Massillon Perry and last year’s champion Wadsworth.
Dean Heil, Mark Martin and Domenic Abounader had their arms raised in triumphant victory, while Edgar Bright, Jay Suvak, Ty Walz, Greg Kuhar, Nick Barber, Jacob Davis and Markus Scheidel all advanced to Columbus enabling head coach Greg Urbas’ team to bring the state championship back home to Lakewood, Ohio.
One of the brighter spots, though, belonged to St. Ignatius High School junior George DiCamillo, who capped off a perfect season (38-0) with an individual state championship in the 112-pound division. Wildcat teammates Tommy Ziegler and Willie Long also made the journey to the state tournament.
It was also a memorable wrestling season at Lakewood High School as coach Vinnie Curaile watched the program send the most state qualifiers to Columbus in quite some time.
Heading the list for the Ranger state participants this winter were Nick Ramsey, Yousef Abdel-Salam and William Abdel-Salam. Ramsey earned a trip to the podium placing fifth, while Yousef Abdel-Salam was eighth.
Olmsted Falls High School continued its dominance and consistency in the sport of wrestling during this past winter.
The Bulldogs sent two grapplers to Columbus in P.J. Mueller and Chase DuPratt. Both Mueller and DuPratt placed in Columbus, while both wrestlers became the school’s 55th and 56th athletes to qualify for the state tournament.
Other top Bulldog wrestlers competing this past winter included Adam Binggeli, Alan Binggeli, Jeremiah Roig, Nick Asadorian, Kyle Kokitka, Scott Ahern, Nick Andler, Alex Bevilacqua, Scott Linville and Nick Sommer.
Overall, 56 state qualifying wrestlers ranks the Olmsted Falls High School program as No. 18 regarding the history of the Ohio High School Athletic Association tournament.
Kyle Biggs led a strong North Olmsted High School wrestling team this past winter with Biggs being crowned a Southwestern Conference champion in the 125-pound division. Other noteworthy performances by other Eagle wrestlers were turned in by David Brunner, Ricky Kelly, Thaer Zayed and Tom DiMarino.
Fairview competed well within the West Shore Conference for the 2010-2011 season. The Warriors, a young squad, were led by the wrestling talent of Justin Farrell, Frank Baffa, Matt Wallace, Tyler Keating and Jack Corcoran.
In the pool, it was another great season for St. Ignatius with several Wildcats qualifying for the state meet in Canton.
Derek Hren led the charge this season placing third in the 200-yard medley relay, while other top season performances were turned in by David Kloos, Peter Simcox, Joseph Rudman, Nathan Christian, William Rosenberg and Henry Chamberlain.
St. Edward was fast in the water as well this past winter season with top efforts recorded by the likes of Brennan Mitchell, Miguel Poblete, Danny Herold, Matt Ventura, Grant Braid and Jeff McManis.
Lakewood swam well within the Northeast Ohio Conference and were led by Kyle Meggas, Brian Brink, Michael Pearlman, Sarah Neff, Maddie Mahoney, Ellen Schleckman, Olivia Lawrence and Brodie Hartsel.
Olmsted Falls, with senior state qualifier Amanda Paliska, had a very strong year in Southwestern Conference action. Other top Bulldog swimmers this year included Taylor Martin, Abigail Vichill, Kit John, Katherine Ashmun, Bridget Liddy, Briaha Carney, Ellen Disrud, Sam Aburaad, Kevin Bohland, Jacob Bolton, Aidan Burton, Keegan Kerr and Gregory Porch.
North Olmsted added some impressive times to its seasonal list of accomplishments and were led by the likes of Jacquelyn Jarachovic, Allie Will, Amanda Trefny, Natalie Balfe, Cathy Wagner, Kristen Troyer, Kara Foraker, Sofia Chinchilla, Megann Ott, Evan Hullinger, Emilio Jarufe, Zachary Zuno, Mark Becks and Steven Davis.
Magnificat High School had another top season with great individual performances by Catherine Horwood, Elizabeth Tamas, Emma Kete, Emily Reinmann, Colleen Carroll, Colleen Hutchinson and Ellen Hutchinson.
Carroll, Horwood and the Hutchinson sisters were state qualifiers.
Fairview High School divers Iven Chaqueco and Alice Clark had impressive scores for the Warriors this season, while other key contributions came from selected swimmers such as Amanda Larsen, Brennan Kilbane, Lauren Crosby, Hallie Fasnacht, Emma Gallagher, Olivia Hvizdos and Patrick Mylett.
St. Joseph Academy swimmers were led this winter by top performances from India Munday, Lauren Kalynchuk, Kaleigh Macalla, Jessica Walsh-Frazier and Emma Ryan.
In gymnastics, Magnificat High School’s Kelly Nortz captured a Division I individual state championship after coming off a season riddled with injuries. Nortz was impressive to say the least at the state championships in Hilliard, Ohio this winter. Nortz will continue her fine gymnastics career at Northern Illinois next year, while becoming just the third Blue Streak athlete to win the all-around title without winning one of the other events.
Other top Magnificat gymnasts included Katelyn McChrystal, Claire Modic, Kathleen Cooney, Brenna Gibbons, Calli Majoy, Brianna Murnan, Hayley Austria, Morgan Coury, Jennifer Heisser, Brianna Kljun, Casey Oleen, Alysha Thompson and Lauren Werling.
Again, apologies to those we may have left out or didn’t capture by way of a photograph. Hopefully, this was a nice trip down memory lane in remembering most of the top scholastic winter student-athletes from the area.
Next week, a look back on the seasons from the sports of basketball, hockey and bowling.
Contact Holzheimer at
(216) 986-2361.
