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High school notebook: Waynesburg wrestling dominates national rankings

3 min read

After winning the WPIAL Class AAA Team Tournament and finishing second in the state event this past season, Waynesburg’s wrestling team appears well-stocked for another successful postseason next winter.

In TheOpenMat.com’s national preseason rankings that were released last week, Waynesburg has four wrestlers ranked among the top-20 nationally in their respective weights classes.

Defending PIAA champion Wyatt Henson is the highest-ranked among the Raiders. Henson, an Iowa recruit who won the PIAA championship at 138 pounds in March, is ranked No. 4 at that weight class.

Mac Church, the third-place finisher in the state at 106, is ranked No. 14 nationally.

Rocco Welsh, a state runner-up a season ago, is ranked No. 13 at 126 pounds.

Luca Augustine, a Pitt recruit who placed sixth at the PIAA meet, is ranked No. 16.

There are 13 WPIAL wrestlers included in the national rankings and six are from the O-R’s coverage area.

Peters Township state runner-up Donovan McMillon is ranked No. 9 at 182 pounds, and Belle Vernon’s Cole Weightman is the No. 20 wrestler at 220. Weightman placed sixth at the PIAA Championships.

McCullough to Niagara

Trinity was expected to have a strong softball team again this spring but the Hillers never got to show it because of the season being canceled.

That didn’t stop some Hillers players from catching the attention of college coaches. Bailey McCullough, who would have played her junior season this year for Trinity, recently committed to Niagara University. The Purple Eagles play in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.

McCullough announced the commitment on Twitter.

Yough’s Evans retires

Donora native Tom Evans is retiring as athletic director at Yough, ending a long and distinguished career as an administrator.

Evans was the longest-tenured athletic director in Westmoreland County. He has been an athletic director or assistant AD since 1993.

A 1980 graduate of Ringgold High School, Evans was selected in April to the WPIAL Hall of Fame. He will be inducted next May.

Evans has been a member of the WPIAL golf steering committee, a liaison for the football and soccer championships at Heinz Field and Highmark Stadium and a member of the WPIAL Board of Directors.

Evans started a 35-year umpiring career in the youth leagues at age 16, when he was a junior at Donora High School, after attending a clinic for potential umpires. Evans started out making $2 per game.

By the time he was 18, Evans had passed the PIAA umpires test and was working high school games, many in the Mon Valley with Jim Chacko. At age 21, Evans was umpiring WPIAL playoff games.

In Evans’ umpiring career, he worked 15 WPIAL championship games and three PIAA finals. He was the home-plate umpire in two of those state championship games. He also umpired at the college level.

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