Canon-McMillan wrestling stays alive with dramatic win at PIAA tournament

By: HSSN Staff
Friday, February 8, 2019 | 8:57 PM

HERSHEY — The Canon-McMillan wrestling team isn’t ready to end the team portion of the season just yet.

The Big Macs, who dropped a match to Cedar Cliff during Day 1 of the PIAA Class AAA team tournament Thursday, picked up two victories in the consolation round Friday at the Giant Center.

Canon-McMillan started the day with a 51-16 win against District 4 champion Selinsgrove, and then it rallied in the final three bouts to defeat Dallastown, the District 3 runner-up, 31-30.

The Big Macs trailed Dallastown, 30-18, before changing the momentum.

Freshman Jacob Houpt started things with a 15-5 major decision win against Caden Dobbins at 106 pounds.

Junior Jimmy Baxter followed with a second period pin of Zach Luckenbaugh at 113, which gave sophomore Costa Moore a chance win the match at 120. Moore scored three takedowns and didn’t allow Adam Karlie to lock in a cradle and won 6-1.

“We knew we needed a pin and bonus (points) if we wanted to pull it out,” Canon-McMillan coach Jeff Havelka said. “There were things that didn’t go our way, but we had guys step up.”

Kenny Hayman (132) and Evan Miller (182) collected pins and Blake Joseph (152) and Gerrit Nijenhuis (195) garnered decisions for the Big Macs, who face Spring-Ford in the third round of consolations at 9 a.m. Saturday.

Paul Schofield is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Paul at pschofield@tribweb.com or via Twitter @Schofield_Trib.

Tags: Canon-McMillan