Sidney senior, Unatego junior look to go out on top

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February 10, 2012

Stafford, Nichols lead 30 seeded wrestlers into Section Four D-II Tournament

By Dean Russin Sports Editor The Daily Star Fri Feb 10, 2012, 02:30 AM EST

Area wrestlers have a lot to prove this weekend at the Broome County Arena in Binghamton.

That's especially true for the ones who fell just short of the championship round of last season's Section Four Division II Tournament.

"We're going to take it one match at a time," Sidney coach Tim Stafford said of his son Scott, the top seed at 120 pounds who is coming off a fourth-place finish at the 2011 tournament. "He's 33-2 and no one in the section has beaten him yet. We're just hoping to continue that and, hopefully, just get to states."

Sidney senior Scott Stafford, a five-time Midstate Athletic Conference champion, joins Unatego junior Codie Nichols as the area's only No. 1 seeds.

"He's got to wrestle hard like he's been doing all year," Unatego coach Mike Hamilton said of Nichols, the top seed at 145 pounds who also finished fourth at the 2011 tournament. "If he keeps doing what he's doing, he'll be fine."

A total of 30 area boys are seeded in the top eight of their respective classes for the overall sectional tournament, which opens with preliminary rounds at 1:30 p.m. today.

Quarterfinals and wrestlebacks are scheduled to begin at 5 p.m. today. The tournament resumes at 10 a.m. Saturday with semifinal matches, followed by the consolation finals at 5 p.m. and the championships at 7 p.m.

Last season, Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton produced champions in Danny Gormley and Vinnie Buttice, along with runner-ups in Daren Terpstra and Paul Parsons. Graduation stole all four from the Bears, who have an area-best eight seeded wrestlers for the 2012 tournament.

Senior Billy Holden, the reigning Daily Star Football Player of the Year, owns B-G/A's highest seed at No. 2 in the 285-pound weight class. He's also the only returning B-G/A wrestler to finish in the top four last season, placing third at 285 with a 3-1 decision over Marathon's Dillon Hurlburt in their consolation final. Should Holden reach the championship match this season, there's a good chance he'll face No. 1 seed James Merritt of Owego for an automatic berth to the state tournament.

Tim Stafford said each Section Four champion will win spots in the Division II state tournament, which runs Feb. 24-25 at the Times-Union Center in Albany. Section Four also will send a handful of wild-card entrants, which will be selected from a pool of non-winners who finish second or third this weekend.

Scott Stafford made the wild-card cut for the 2009 state tournament but has not been back since.

"He lost his first two matches and was out," Tim Stafford said. "It's an ultimate goal as a wrestler just to get to states."

Stafford's weight class features Unatego freshman Austin Ryan as the No. 2 seed.

"There's no question he's a contender," Tim Stafford said of Ryan, who is 0-3 against his son this season. "You can't overlook anyone at this point. You've got to respect them all."

Four other area boys will be trying to bump Nichols off the top spot at 145 pounds as the weight class includes B-G/A teammates Corey Burnett (third) and Jamie Griswold (fifth), Unatego's Ryan Marszal (fourth) and Walton's Kyle Constable (seventh).

Should those seeds hold, Nichols and Marszal will meet in a sectional semifinal.

"That probably improves our chances," Hamilton said. "If they both make it to the semis, we're guaranteed a spot in the finals.

"Our seeded guys, they should all wrestle well this weekend and be all-section," he continued. "They all wrestle together and they're all really good wrestlers. They're great practice partners for each other. It really helps when we go to tournaments because they all wrestle really good guys all year."

Other top-four placewinners from 2011 who will try for sectional crowns this season are Walton's Dylan Wood (third) and Mike Beers (fourth), Sidney's Nicholas Jump (fourth) and Delhi's Cody LaFever (fourth).

Wood and Beers are seeded second at 99 and 182, respectively, for the Warriors, who have five wrestlers seeded in the top eight.

Jump, who won a MAC title Jan. 28, is seeded second at 160, and LaFever is No. 4 at 170.

Oneonta High and Unadilla Valley have two seeded wrestlers apiece. Cory Corkwell is No. 6 at 285 for the Yellowjackets, who have Fred Thomas seeded seventh at 170. Kalvin Abrams is fourth at 99 pounds for the Storm, who have Dustin Badger seeded fifth at 132.

SECTION FOUR D-II TOURNAMENT

AREA SEEDS

Area seeds in the top eight for the two-day Section Four Division II Wrestling Tournament, which starts at 1:30 p.m. today at the Broome County Arena in Binghamton.

B-G/A

99 _ 5, Austin Carr; 120 _ 8, Kevin Hubbard; 132 _ 4, Justin Cirigliano; 138 _ 4, Jesse Griswold; 145 _ 3, Corey Burnett; 145 _ 5, Jamie Griswold; 195 _ 3, Mark Viviano; 285 _ 2, Billy Holden (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton).

Delhi

152 _ 6, Collin Ellis; 170 _ 4, Cody LaFever; 195 _ 5, Bryan Ingram.

Oneonta

170 _ 7, Fred Thomas; 285 _ 6, Cory Corkwell.

Sidney

120 _ 1, Scott Stafford; 160 _ 2, Nicholas Jump; 195 _ 7, Alex Morrow; 285 _ 3, Austin Dean.

Unadilla Valley

99 _ 4, Kalvin Abrams; 132 _ 5, Dustin Badger.

Unatego

120 _ 2, Austin Ryan; 132 _ 7, Lucas DeJoy; 138 _ 3, Kevin Thayer; 145 _ 1, Codie Nichols; 145 _ 4, Ryan Marszal; 152 _ 5, Leland Slawson.

Walton

99 _ 2, Dylan Wood; 106 _ 6, Logan Robinson; 145 _ 7, Kyle Constable; 152 _ 7, Jimmy Copeland; 182 _ 2, Mike Beers.

___

OVERALL SEEDS

The top-eight seeds in each weight class for the two-day Section Four Division II Wrestling Tournament, which starts at 1:30 p.m. today at the Broome County Arena in Binghamton.

99 _ 1, Joe Nelson (Oxford); 2, Dylan Wood (Walton); 3, Madison Hoover (Harpursville); 4, Kalvin Abrams (Unadilla Valley); 5, Austin Carr (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); 6, Jackson Bell (Owego); 7, Ryan Kwiatkowski (Owego); 8, Braxton Howell (Greene). Also competing: Holden Smith (Unatego); Mitchell Spaziani (Oneonta)

106 _ 1, Lucas Malmberg (Marathon); 2, Sean Ballard (Whitney Point); 3, Billy Liberati (Chenango Valley); 4, Brendan Wheeler (Greene); 5, Greg Lee (Lansing); 6, Logan Robinson (Walton); 7, Colby Hall (Deposit); 8, Jake Andrews (Harpursville). Also competing: Caleb Simons (Unadilla Valley); Chase Northrop (Sidney).

113 _ 1, William Koll (Lansing); 2, Nate Hayes (Windsor); 3, Kaleb Stone (Tioga); 4, Ryan Castle (Greene); 5, Stephen McKee (Deposit); 6, Billy Bacon (Odessa-Montour); 7, Devin Horton (Owego); 8, Chris Surace (Susquenango Valley). Also competing: Dakota Allen (Walton); Brett Hubbard (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); Dalton Ormsby (Oneonta); James Martin (Sidney).

120 _ 1, Scott Stafford (Sidney); 2, Austin Ryan (Unatego); 3, Ian Lupole (Susquenango Valley); 4, Anthony Colon (Chenango Valley); 5, Dan Hosking (Tioga); 6, Jason Lobdell (Deposit); 7, Darren Ostrander (Groton); 8, Kevin Hubbard (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton). Also competing: Brandon Brown (Unadilla Valley); Mel Ackley (Oneonta); Tommy Caldarulo (Walton).

126 _ 1, Tristan Rifanburg (Norwich); 2, Corey Dake (Lansing); 3, Tyler Hall (Marathon); 4, Jesse Manuel (Tioga); 5, Austyn Bostwick (Waverly); 6, Dustin Greene (Chenango Valley); 7, Nate Bell (Owego); 8, Michael Robinson (Harpursville). Also competing: John MacRabie (Walton); Trey Mostert (Delhi); Jake DeJoy (Unatego); Mat Higgins (Sidney).

132 _ 1, Jesse Williams (Windsor); 2, Connor Lapresi (Lansing); 3, Frank Garcia (Norwich); 4, Justin Cirigliano (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); 5, Dustin Badger (Unadilla Valley); 6, Dustin Cummings (Watkins Glen); 7, Lucas DeJoy (Unatego); 8, Jon Wingerter (Deposit). Also competing: Justin Mattice (Delhi); Austin Scheer (Oneonta); Dylan Gifford (Sidney); Dawson Beers (Walton); Joe Brown (Delhi).

138 _ 1, Adam Greene (Chenango Valley); 2, Trevor Nocchi (Waverly); 3, Kevin Thayer (Unatego); 4, Jesse Griswold (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); 5, David Wheat (Seton Catholic); 6, Trevor Parrish (Greene); 7, Josh Lobdell (Deposit); 8, Joe Judge (Spencer-Van Etten). Also competing: Derek Northrop (Sidney); Ray James (Walton); Tyler Olson (Unadilla Valley); James Longo (Oneonta).

145 _ 1, Codie Nichols (Unatego); 2, Kyle Halladay (Chenango Valley); 3, Corey Burnett (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); 4, Ryan Marszal (Unatego); 5, Jamie Griswold (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); 6, Jerid Rimbey (Spencer-Van Etten); 7, Kyle Constable (Walton); 8, Matt Kistner (Windsor). Also competing: Tanner Loos (Oneonta); Noah DeDominicis (Delhi).

152 _ 1, Dan Dickman (Greene); 2, Tanner Cummings (Norwich); 3, Jordan Torbitt (Whitney Point); 4, Brandon Ellers (Waverly); 5, Leland Slawson (Unatego); 6, Collin Ellis (Delhi); 7, Jimmy Copeland (Walton); 8, Nik Hansen (Oxford). Also competing: Jacob Vaccaro (Oneonta); Josh Akshar (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton).

160 _ 1, Mike Beckwith (Greene); 2, Nicholas Jump (Sidney); 3, Nick Matthews (Whitney Point); 4, Christian Richter (Tioga); 5, Vincent Ferrone (Spencer-Van Etten); 6, Anthony Vitiello (Norwich); 7, Brett Ramsey (Greene); 8, Joel Gryskevicz (Chenango Valley). Also competing: Riley Hanrahan (Unatego).

170 _ 1, Ryan Walcott (Waverly); 2, Adam Hughey (Watkins Glen); 3, Joel Roselle (Greene); 4, Cody LaFever (Delhi); 5, Tyler Spires (Tioga); 6, Joe Jackson (Oxford); 7, Fred Thomas (Oneonta); 8, Dylan Moshier (Chenango Valley). Also competing: Nate Wilsey (Unatego).

182 _ 1, Keegan Cerwinski (Greene); 2, Mike Beers (Walton); 3, Cody Bradbury (Norwich); 4, Luke Zakrajsek (Windsor); 5, Brendon VanEtten (Harpursville); 6, Caleb Cutting (Oxford); 7, Brett Baker (Deposit); 8, Brad Jump (Tioga). Also competing: Francis Thomas (Oneonta).

195 _ 1, Ryan Todd (Lansing); 2, Kegan Levesque (Norwich); 3, Mark Viviano (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); 4, Jesse Angevine (Windsor); 5, Bryan Ingram (Delhi); 6, Chris Todd (Moravia); 7, Alex Morrow (Sidney); 8, Seth Gordon (Windsor). Also competing: Khalil Derios (Oneonta); Alex Avoilio (Unadilla Valley); Eddie Castillo (Walton).

220 _ 1, Kyle Stanton (Greene); 2, Nick Talcott (Tioga); 3, Matt Abbott (Windsor); 4, Dillon Hurlbert (Marathon); 5, Tristan Roche (Susquenango Valley); 6, Dakota White (Lansing); 7, Brandon Backus (Whitney Point); 8, Pat Stoyell (Moravia). Also competing: Shane Curtin (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton).

285 _ 1, James Merritt (Owego); 2, Billy Holden (Bainbridge-Guilford/Afton); 3, Austin Dean (Sidney); 4, Andrew Gillette (Moravia); 5, Steve Kerrigan (Susquenango Valley); 6, Cory Corkwell (Oneonta); 7, Kraig Parker (Dryden); 8, Christian Seyerle (Marathon). Also competing: Bradey Bean (Unatego); Joe Hahn (Walton).

Dean Russin can be reached at drussin@thedailystar.com or 607-432-1000, ext. 215.