Schram hits jackpot with championship in Reno tournament
Moving up a weight class for the event, former Canon-McMillan standout wrestler Connor Schram won the 133-pound title at the Reno Tournament of Champions on Dec. 18.
Schram, a redshirt junior at Stanford, helped the Cardinal to a sixth-place finish in the team standings.
Schram entered the tournament ranked No. 15 in the country at 125 pounds. He had a 4-0 record in Reno and defeated Wyoming’s Drew Templeman with a 3-1 sudden victory in the finals. Schram pinned Southwest Oregon Community College’s Beau Shatto and Eastern Oregon’s Terran Libolt in the first two rounds before earning his first of two sudden victory wins in the semifinals against Mike Magaldo of Oklahoma State.
A two-time state and four-time WPIAL champion at Canon-McMillan, Schram has an 8-2 record this season and a 46-12 career record.
Who said post players aren’t good free-throw shooters? They must not have been talking about Bucknell’s Kaitlyn Slagus.
A Belle Vernon graduate, Slagus is a 6-2 sophomore forward who leads the Patriot League in both rebounding and free-throw percentage.
Slagus is one of only two players in the conference who average a double-double of points and rebounds. She averages 10.3 rebounds per game and is Bucknell’s second-leading scorer at 14.2 points per game.
What is most impressive about Slagus’ play is that she is shooting 88 percent from the free-throw line. She has made 36 of 41 attempts.
Slagus had her third straight double-double, and seventh of the season, in Bucknell’s 67-64 win over visiting Navy last Friday. She scored 17 points and grabbed 10 rebounds as Bucknell won the game, 67-64, then had 13 points and 11 rebounds Wednesday as the Bison outlasted American 73-67 in overtime to extend their home-court winning streak to 18 games. Bucknell leads the Patriot League with a 3-0 conference record and is 11-3 overall.
Josh Wise of Washington scored a career-high 19 points in Pitt-Johnstown’s 80-58 victory over Clarion in a PSAC West Division game last Friday.
Wise, a redshirt freshman, made eight of 13 shots from the field including 3 of 5 from three-point range.
A former Observer-Reporter Boys Basketball Player of the Year while at Wash High, Wise is averaging 9.4 points per game , shooting 47 percent from the field and 42 percent from three-point range.
Mercyhurst’s Francis Mizia was named the outstanding wrestler of the 38th Midwest Classic held in Indianapolis Dec. 17-18. Mizia, a Bentleyville native and Bentworth graduate, won 165-pound title with a 14-5 major decision in the finals over defending NCAA Division II national champion Tyler Reinhart Pitt-Johnstown.
Mizia opened scoring with a takedown and four back points with seven seconds left in the first period and increased his advantage to 8-3 after two periods.
Mizia was named the PSAC Wrestler of the Week after his performance in the Midwest Classic, during which he earned his 100th career win with a pin in the second round of the tournament.
Senior Colton Shorts, Cal Poly’s first nationally ranked wrestler in two years and a second-place finisher at the Reno Tournament of Champions, was named the Cal Poly Student-Athlete of the Week for Dec. 12-18.
The 157-pounder from Canonsburg had a 4-1 record and helped Cal Poly to a fourth-place team finish.
Shorts earned one fall, two wins by decision and a major decision en route to his spot in the 157-pound finals, where he was decisioned by No. 13 Archie Colgan of Wyoming, 3-1.
Shorts has a 15-8 record on the season with four falls. He is ranked No. 19 in his weight class by The Open Mat.
Shorts is a graduate of Canon-McMillan, where he was a two-time PIAA placewinner. He has 63 career wins for Cal Poly.
• Pitt freshman Austin Bell recorded his first dual-meet win Dec. 11 and helped the Panthers to a 23-15 win over West Virginia.
Bell won a 9-0 major decision over Ty Millward at 174 pounds. After a scorless first period, Bell scored four points in the second period and five in the third. A graduate of Belle Vernon, where he won 160 career bouts, Bell has a 6-7 record with Pitt.
• Seton Hill redshirt sophomore Jake Temple, a former PIAA champion from Avella, placed third at 197 pounds at the PSAC Championships held last month in Lock Haven.
Temple bounced back from an opening-round loss to win four straight victories including a 3-1 sudden victory win over Edinboro’s Dylan Reynolds in the third-place match.
Shippensburg junior Alec Rideout, an outdoor national qualifier in the shot put last year, got the indoor season off to a strong start last month in the Bison Opener at Bucknell University.
A Canonsburg native, Rideout set a personal-best throw of 56-2½ inches, a mark even farther than his outdoor PR of 56-1 achieved last year at the NCAA Division II Championships.
Rideout also placed fifth in the weight throw of 51-9¼.