PHS, WW-PN find MCT highlights

Knights have pair of third-place wrestlers

By: Justin Feil
   TRENTON — If Bill Mealy and Rashone Johnson had their way, their wrestling teams would have finished a bit higher at the Mercer County Tournament. But overall, the area coaches were pleased with what they saw from their teams Saturday at Trenton High.
   "I felt pretty good about it," said Mealy, head coach of West Windsor-Plainsboro High North, which came in 11th. "One of the things we’ve been looking for is guys wrestling a little tougher and a little smarter. If we can continue to wrestle like that, it’s going to help us move along."
   Princeton finished right behind WW-PN in 12th place. Alex Schwerin was fourth and eighth-seeded Andrew Mahar finished fifth for the Little Tigers. Paul LaPlaca also reached the fifth-place match at 152.
   "We’re going to look at is the positive things," PHS head coach Rashone Johnson said. "Paul LaPlaca, Alex Schwerin, and actually Will Borchert and Blake Mitchell had solid performances. Some guys wrestled tough."
   The Knights won a pair of third-place matches to highlight their Saturday. George Goldsmith defeated Schwerin, 18-5, while Omar Hatab beat Trenton’s Robert Rentas, 7-4. The only disappointment in that was that Hatab had hoped to be in the finals against eventual winner Tim Woodhull of West Windsor-Plainsboro High South.
   "Omar definitely thought he was going to be wrestling Tim Woodhull in the finals," Mealy said. "He got hurt in the Notre Dame match and once Omar couldn’t drive off that ankle, he had to step off his other foot and the Notre Dame kid was good."
   Hatab took out his frustration on his next two opponents. He pinned Lawrence’s Dan Lookner before defeating Rentas.
   "Omar gets so emotional with everything, win or lose," Mealy said. "I’ve never had a problem with him going off on anybody, but he really gets into it. He’s a great guy.
   "George is getting to be a lot like Omar. The bout before (the third-place win), was against (Matt) Benedetti of Steinert. He major decisioned George last year. He really wanted to wrestle better there and he did to win. Now he’s trying to figure out what he could have done better. He lost to (Brandan) Tyers of Hightstown."
   WW-PN also had a pair of fifth-place finishers in Alex Ragucci and Steve Wolf, who topped LaPlaca for his medal.
   "I was really pleased," Mealy said. "Steve Smagula had to wrestle five times (Saturday). Alex Ragucci had to wrestle five times. Those wrestlebacks can be tough, especially if you lose early."
   PHS was able to fight back through wrestlebacks to pick up some of its points as well. It was just what Johnson was looking for from the Little Tigers.
   "At 103, Ross Zebhur went 2-2," Johnson said. "At 119, Alex wrestled tough against two solid competitors. He didn’t back down. Levy (Guerrero) won a match at 125. Mahar took fifth at 135 and he beat the kid from Hightstown that he lost to earlier in the season. Paul ended up taking sixth, but he only lost to (WW-PN’s) Wolf twice.
   "Will Borchert didn’t get a good draw. He wrestled really hard, really tough. He had a good match against Notre Dame. It’ll be interesting to see how he does when we go up against them. At 189, Blake lost both his matches but did well in both of them. If he can correct some little things, he’ll be fine."
   And so will the WW-PN and PHS wrestling teams if they continue to work as hard as they did at the Mercer County Tournament. The Little Tigers wrestle at Notre Dame 10 a.m. Saturday while WW-PN wrestles at Allentown 6:30 p.m. Wednesday after a scheduled match against Pennington on Monday.