Canon-McMillan falls to Cedar Cliff
HERSHEY – The Canon-McMillan wrestling team was going to have a tough task on Thursday night.
The Big Macs, who finished third in the WPIAL Class AAA Team Tournament, travelled halfway across the state to the Giant Center in Hershey for a matchup with undefeated District 3 champion Cedar Cliff in the PIAA Team Tournament.
While Jeff Havelka’s squad put up a fight against the Colts, it was Cedar Cliff that would come out victorious with a 43-16 dual meet win.
Canon-McMillan started strong as Costa Moore scored the last five points of the opening match at 113 pounds to grab a 5-2 win and put his team up 3-0.
The Colts, however, would reel off eight consecutive wins and 33 consecutive points to take an all-but-insurmountable lead.
From that point, the Big Macs would need to put together five consecutive pins to end the dual and grab a victory on criteria.
That quest started well enough at 182 as Gerrit Nijenhuis, nursing a heavily wrapped left knee, picked up a fall in 2:41 over Cedar Cliff’s Jayvon Godineux.
“It’s been pretty much since December with him,” Havelka said of Nijenhuis’ knee injury. “He’s wrestling with it and learning to manage it too, so we were always going to send him out there.”
It appeared Evan Miller would keep the dual meet within reach for the Big Macs at 195 pounds as he got out to a big lead over Elijah Ikeda, including two full sets of back points. But Miller was unable to obtain the fall and came away with a 14-3 major decision, making the score, 33-13.
Penn State commit Donovan Ball put an exclamation point on the dual meet for Cedar Cliff when he pinned Alec Hendal at 2:25 of the second period .
The Big Macs’ final win of the evening came at heavyweight and in thrilling fashion as Giomar Ramos got a takedown in sudden victory to grab a 3-1 win over Anthony Shires.
“They kind of took it to us a little bit,” Havelka said of the loss. “But it is what is it sometimes and we’ll get back after it (Friday).”
Canon-McMillan returns to action today in consolation action against District 4 representative Selinsgrove. The Seals dropped their opening match of the tournament to District 11 powerhouse Northampton, 64-9.
“We’re just focusing on wrestling a hard six minutes and coming back strong,” Havelka said when asked what he’ll say to his team ahead of the consolation match.