A-K Valley wrestling notebook: Two Kiski Area wrestlers land No. 1 seeds for WPIAL championships

By: HSSN Staff
Thursday, March 1, 2018 | 12:16 AM

Bob Banks became one of Kiski Area’s most significant wrestlers during his high school days in the 1970s, and the current Cavaliers showed their appreciation earlier this week.

Nearly a dozen Kiski Area wrestlers, coach Chris Heater and assistants Chuck Tursky and Don Toy visited Banks, who is dealing with an illness, at his home Tuesday. The Cavaliers gave him a medal from their runner-up finish at this season’s PIAA Class AAA team championships, along with one of their “TEAM” T-shirts.

Banks, a 1973 Kiski Area graduate, won WPIAL individual championships in 1972 and 1973 and became the Cavaliers’ first PIAA tournament qualifier in 1972. He had a combined 45-2 record in those two seasons.

Since Banks broke through, more than 50 other Kiski Area wrestlers competed at the state tournament — including his son, Bobby Banks, who took second in the state in 1994.

Two on top

Kiski Area might not have any returning champions for the upcoming WPIAL Class AAA championships, but the Cavaliers do have a pair of wrestlers favored to take home the title.

The WPIAL wrestling committee awarded seniors Noah Levett (138 pounds) and Isaac Reid (285 pounds) the top seeds in their respective weight classes for the two-day, double-elimination tournament, which begins Friday at Canon-McMillan.

Both Levett and Reid are coming off runner-up finishes as juniors, with Levett falling to Franklin Regional’s Spencer Lee and Reid to Canon-McMillan’s Brendan Furman. They were two of six Kiski Area wrestlers to win titles at last weekend’s Section 1-AAA tournament.

Senior Cam Connor received the No. 2 seed at 145 pounds, senior Danny Starr earned the No. 3 seed at 195 and junior Darren Miller (120) and sophomores Jack Blumer (152) and Nick Delp (160) were awarded No. 4 seeds.

Coming up Cutch

Fox Chapel’s Donovan Cutchember had a breakout performance on his home mats with a runner-up finish earlier this season at the Allegheny County Tournament, and he took it a step further last weekend.

The sophomore 220-pounder won a Section 3-AAA title Saturday at Fox Chapel, beating North Allegheny’s Ben Grafton by a 5-1 decision in the final.

Cutchember earned the No. 6 seed for the WPIAL tournament and will wrestle Greensburg Salem’s Will Gongaware in the first round.

Four other Foxes wrestlers — Avery Bursick (138 pounds), Sean Mahon (170), Zach Carcy (182) and Ed Farrell (195) — will join Cutchember at WPIALs.

The one and only

Plum, which dealt with a numbers crunch this season, will have one wrestler at the WPIAL tournament in junior Colin Stecik.

Stecik finished fourth at 160 pounds at last weekend’s Section 1-AAA tournament, falling in overtime to Gateway’s Caleb Lehman in the third-place match. He’ll wrestle Baldwin’s Jamil Khalil in the pigtail round at WPIALs.

Better late than never

Burrell advanced five wrestlers to Hershey, but three of them — senior Shaun Gates, junior Austin Mele and freshman A.J. Corrado — needed to do it the hard way.

The trio all lost their first match at last weekend’s PIAA Class AA Southwest Regional, forcing them to record at least three wins each in the consolation bracket to secure their spot at states. All three ultimately did so — perhaps because they have some experience in such must-win situations.

“Losing that first match and coming back just shows a lot of character, a lot of fight,” Burrell coach Josh Shields said. “We seem to have a tendency to do that. I know we always do it at the team tournament, but I guess these guys like taking the harder road and really like earning the trip to Hershey.”

Doug Gulasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at dgulasy@tribweb.com or via Twitter @dgulasy_Trib.

Tags: Burrell, Fox Chapel, Kiski School, Plum