Baldwin Wrestlers Fall to Seneca Valley, 48-26

Non-section match. End of the season. These ones aren’t supposed to matter too much, especially for two squads that won’t be in the team playoffs this season anyway.

Not so, said George McCormack and Tom Tomeo, ’s and ’s head varsity wrestling coaches, respectively. Though the teams, who met at Baldwin on Feb. 3, have gone as far as they can this season, the squads’ individuals need all of the fine-tuning that they can get with the WPIAL’s AAA individual section championships starting on Feb. 26.

Still, team matches always count, and not just for overall records. For example …

“Pride,” as Baldwin Assistant Coach Blake Toki put it.

And Baldwin had plenty to be proud of despite a 48-26 home loss to the Raiders.

Seneca, after all, came into the match with an impressive 13-4 overall record this season despite missing the team playoffs. Baldwin, which entered the match at 7-8 overall, fought Seneca tooth and nail despite giving away 24 team points due to forfeits.

Indeed, Seneca wrestlers earned four walkover wins against Baldwin while boasting a much deeper lineup. According to Toki, the Raiders fielded 25 wrestlers to the Highlanders’ 12.

Throw out the forfeits, and Baldwin went 5-5 in individual matches against Seneca. 

There’s no guarantee that Baldwin would have actually taken any of the 24 points that they gave away, but McCormack would have liked to have given it a shot.

“We did originally [have wrestlers in the missing weight categories],” he said, “but we’re so banged up right now. We have four starters that are out of the lineup – most of them seniors.

“It’s unfortunate, but we’ve gone through the gauntlet. You name it; we’ve been through it – concussions, separated shoulders, torn knees. It hit us right here at the end of the season.

“We ended up losing by 22, and we gave them 24 points, so if we would have had our lineup, it would have been a different story.”

Seneca is still fighting for a lot of team goals this year, according to Tomeo, and was perhaps slightly more motivated to earn a team win.

“We went 2-3 in the section [this season],” he said. “We have a pretty strong section … [but] right now, we’re 14-4. We got a real solid record.

“[Baldwin] was our 498th [all-time] win, so we have a push with two dual matches left this season to win them both and get to 500.”

Seneca Valley has won its last nine dual matches.

Most importantly though, these late-season dual matches are about the individuals, and the night saw quite a few impressive individual matches, including a pivotal 12-11 win by Seneca’s freshman Anthony Latess over junior Said Hasanovic when the team match’s final score was still in doubt.

Latess and Hasanovic were squaring off at 112 pounds for the ninth decision of the night when the score was still just a four-point difference in Seneca’s favor. Baldwin never got closer the rest of the way.

Hasanovic led Latess, 2-0, after the first period before Latess battled back to make it 9-6 the other way after the second. Latess eventually led, 12-9, with less than 10 seconds to go in that match, but two late points brought Hasanovic within striking distance. That proved to be too little too late as the match’s final horn sounded while the two were entangled.

Though four of the night’s matches were decided by forfeits, pinfalls decided six of the night’s other 10 decisions.

Each team scored three pinfalls, though Baldwin recorded the most lopsided non-pinfall wins. 

Baldwin’s sophomore Cameron Starr defeated sophomore Tyler Bommer, 15-2, at 160 pounds, and senior Randy Bush shut out Seneca’s sophomore Brad Abramson, 11-0, at 285 pounds.

“Everything we’re basically doing right now is trying to get them [Baldwin’s individuals] ready for sectionals,” McCormack said. “We gotta try to keep the kids busy in this time right now, so we had Seneca tonight, we’ll have Peters tomorrow and we got our last match next week.

“It still gives us about two weeks after that until the section tournament. More or less, a lot of the stuff that we have now is getting us ready for that.

“At the beginning of the season, we set team goals and set individual goals, so once the team stuff’s over, it’s, ‘Let’s see how far each one of you can get on your own now.’”

Tomeo and his team are looking forward to the individual section championships as well.

“We’ve got solid guys that have placed well in top tournaments,” he said, pointing out 103-pound freshman Nick Zoria, 119-pound junior Jake Perri and 125-pounder senior Aaron Schettler, specifically.

Each school may enter one wrestler per weight class for the individual section championships.