One of the arguments around the country is the toughness of a particular state’s season ending championship tournament. Of course, many point to the states with the best talent and, regardless of the event construction, say those are the best, or among the best. And they’re right of course. The most obvious example of this is Pennsylvania. Widely regarded, perhaps unanimously so, as the toughest wrestling state, its tournament is a candidate for toughest, but it’s split into two divisions. Taken individually, each division is up there with any state. In totality it is the largest collection of national talent in one building in a single state. However, it is also obviously true that the toughest tournament possible in PA would combine both divisions. Maybe they’ll do that some day. No they won’t.
Other top states that use a multi-division design are Illinois, Ohio, and well just about every other state does – the strong and not as strong alike. But there are states that run a single division tournament. And in that group are a few very strong states as well. California is most notable for the sheer size of its population, even just wrestling participation, it leads the nation. And when looking at ranked wrestlers for example, CA has more in a single tournament (PA has more combined). Indiana is another state that uses a one division system and every year you get some real strong NCAA prospects out of there. New Jersey is the 3rd of the “strong” states that compete in a single division.
So what does this mean, why am I working through all this. Well, because for NJ and CA in particular the number of boys 4 time state champions is remarkably low. In fact, I believe they are tied with 4 such champions ever. In the entire history. 4. That’s it. On the girls side, Kira Pipkins has also done it.
Of course to get there, one has to start their career in spectacular fashion. Winning that first title the first year out. And so we always keep a keen eye on the freshmen with the chance to do that and see just how they end up. It’s tough to wrestle a first HS season, a highly competitive schedule, and then navigate 3 days of weigh-ins and competition against older, more physically mature opponents. So, there is something special about those able to do it. Doing it doesn’t guarantee replicating it the remaining three years, but it does set the table at least. And any feast needs a table. Just don’t ask my kids to set. Forks on the right. Or is it left? Apparently, you shouldn’t ask me to do it either.
Heading into Atlantic City there were a handful of freshmen that had a realistic shot at pulling this feat off. And coming away from Atlantic City, we have a handful of freshmen now on the 4-time clock.
The freshman from Delbarton wasn’t just among the handful of freshmen around New Jersey with a shot at being a 4 timer, he was among a handful on his own team with that ability. And as we’ll see in just a minute, a teammate of his joins him on this journey.
Sontz season got started in pretty great fashion, reaching the Beast of the East finals against the top 106 pounder in the country, Joe Bachmann (ironically enough also a freshman, from PA). He held his own in that marquee matchup and kept it rolling all season.
He suffered a loss to yet another national freshman phenom in Shamus Regan (Wyoming Seminary) but was then able to avenge that loss and even finish the season with the 2-1 series lead head to head.
His only other hiccups along the way were when he bumped up to battle a top 10 senior from Wyoming Seminary (Davis Motyka) and to fellow New Jersey rival Killian Coluccio in the dual that would ultimately send Delbarton to the team state finals. And it was this result that would be most relevant to Atlantic City and set the stage for a possible rematch, for all the marbles.
But the NJSIAA still hasn’t figured out what to do with freshmen and they say that like it’s a good thing and so these two freshmen would meet in the semis, not the finals. Oh well. At least it happened at all. And in this setting, it was Sontz coming out with the win, getting revenge on an opponent for the 2nd time this season.
And he would close out the deal in the finals against Anthony Mason, a sophomore from Southern that we’ve thought highly of all season and even predicted to be in the finals once the brackets were released. I expect him to be a worthy opponent for Sontz these next two years, should they be at the same weight. Although it’s safe to say the state’s best rivalry brewing for the next three years will be Sontz Coluccio. And assuming they stay at the same weight, it could well be Coluccio is the one that halts the Sontz championship train.
But that’s a story for another day. A bridge to cross when we get there. For now, this is about a super frosh who did exactly what you would expect and part of the Green Wave rolling through the Garden State that shows no signs of slowing down.
Like Sontz, DeGeorge was a freshmen coming in for the Green Wave with the expectations of filling in for departed state champion seniors. Not at their weights but rather just on the roster. Last year, the Green Wave had 4 champions, Tyler Vazquez, Alessio Perentin, Louie Cerchio, and Simon Ruiz. With Vazquez and Ruiz graduating, they would need two new wrestlers to step up. And they got that. They got it from Sontz and they got it from DeGeorge. (They also had a 3rd first time champion, Vinnie Lee).
Ryan DeGeorge didn’t have quite the same start to the season as Sontz. He finished a respectable 4th at Beast, but his two losses were both to New Jersey kids (Sammy Spaulding and Sebastian Ortega). So, he was early on somewhere in the top 5 within the state but not quite at the top. Obviously, he’d eventually get there.
The season kept marching and he kept climbing. Delbarton had what I would say was the toughest schedule of the year in the country and DeGeorge was ultimately the beneficiary of that sharpening process – at least I’d say so from my outside perspective.
He got wins over a CA placer, another talented freshman at Sem, and Chris Vargo who just made waves beating #2 Jax Forrest in the regional finals in PA. So, he took some lumps, like Luke Lilledahl, but he came to Atlantic City better for the wear.
After that defeat to the top kid in the country (on 1/13) DeGeorge wouldn’t lose again. And in fact, wouldn’t even really be tested until the finals Saturday afternoon.
I suppose with a likely 4-timer sitting out there in the state with one year of eligibility left (Anthony Knox), much will depend on how the weights break down these next few years. And even without Knox, the group of Seach Hibler, Spaulding, Ortega will provide plenty of challenge as well.
But as we sit now, it is the Green Wave freshmen perched in the “hunted” position. The kid that the rest will be chasing. We’ll see if anyone can catch him or if he can make it through the hunt once again unscathed.
While I might say the toughest weight for any of the state’s top freshmen title contenders was 165 and Tanner Hodgins, the next toughest would have to be 144. And maybe it’s not for the depth of the bracket but rather the top dawg sitting at that 1 seed. I really thought Amato would push Nini, make that a finals to pay attention to, but ultimately the elder classman would hold up. And if that is what happened, no one would bat an eye or think twice about Amato still being state champion favorite the rest of his career.
Well, Sonny himself had other plans. And plans that were possibly foreshadowed by some of his early season results.
Of all the Jersey class of 27 kids, I would say Amato was the premier of that prestigious group. Again, just a matter of the level of competition at the weight that would be a possible cause to pause. But, it can’t be overlooked that he did also pick up the single best win in the state at 144 all season, Maddox Shaw, in the Beast quarterfinals.
He would ultimately fall in close matches with Chase Van Hoven (VA) and Logan Rozyski (Blair) to finish 4th there. It was the Shaw result that showed he could get over the hump against a top 5 wrestler in the country. The exact kind of obstacle Nini would present in the state.
And that finals between the freshman and the senior was close, hardfought, and could have gone either way. But it didn’t go either way. It went Sonny’s way. And now he’s on his way to perhaps being among Garden State royalty as a 4-timer.
Again, we don’t know how weights shake out, but just at 138, Jayden James made a jump from 113 and figures to grow more. Maybe Amato goes after fellow champ, Zack Ballante, who was at 150 this season. It’s just too early to tell where the biggest threats to his title defense will come from but what we do know is that he’s ready for the fight and already proving to be a leader in NJ wrestling at the high school level.
I mean, it’s pretty obvious I missed my calling as a headline writer for a major newspaper, right? Like the play on words, I’m a punny guy. It’s a gift. Or a curse. Or both. I guess it all depends how you feel about wordplay. But I think what we can all agree on is watching athletes grow through their journey, unlocking new levels, and perhaps even surprising themselves along the way.
Now, I don’t know Ryan Burton at all to speak to his internal motivations or goals or self-assessment, but I do know as a short-time competitor. and long-time fan of the sport, he’s had one of the biggest jumps between years that I can recall. He was a 3rd place New Jersey bronze medalist last year. And as I’ve already said, placing at all in this tournament is an accomplishment. Placing 3rd is really good. And he was really good. And we all thought he would be a great foe to stand in the way of the returning state champion at the same weight. And he had much, much different plans.
It all started, at least for me, with the Super 32 title. Now, all by itself it wouldn’t be enough to indicate a massive jump because the weight class there wasn’t quite as deep with the top 10 type talent as some other weights. But, it’s undeniable that every weight is still always deeper with top 25 guys than any state bracket. So, great, Super 32 champ. He’s on the rise.
And then it was the 1-1 season split with Gage Wright. They traded Beast and Powerade titles, and with those results, also traded 1 and 2 in the country. Now, we’re talking. It began with Beast. Where Burton took care of business against Wright, the #1 in the country at that point and then Adam Waters, a PA state champion. And that got him right there at #1 in the country. But looming large in the Garden State was the 165 defending champion, also up at 175, Louie Cerchio.
Cerchio was initially expected to be in the same Beast bracket with Delbarton but a few guys didn’t make that trip so we would have to wait. But not long. They would first meet up at Powerade and we would all get to see if the gains we saw from Burton had actually caught him up to the guy who won his bracket last year. And we saw it. He won that. And even with the loss to Wright in the finals, wouldn’t surrender the top spot in the state (as Wright wrestles in West Virginia) for the rest of the season.
And it was a rest of the season that brought two more battles with Cerchio. One thing wrestlers talk about is avenging losses. They talk about it driving them, pushing them even that much harder. So you had to figure Cerchio would be ready to go for round 2. And he was. He looked like he made some adjustments and even had himself a lead. And then Burton did something that only 2024 Burton could do, and showed that growth for certain, winning with the fall.
And then, of course, we had the state finals bracket. Atlantic City. It’s hard to beat the same quality opponent twice, it’s diabolical to do it three times. And in a match that lived up to the hype (I thought it would be the best finals of the 14), Burton came out with one of the most clutch takedowns to secure the win.
Cerchio entered the 3rd period up 3-1 with Burton choosing down. An escape and a takedown gave Burton the 4-3 lead for the few seconds until Cerchio escaped. Tied 4-4 with about 30 seconds left, it looked like Sudden Victory was inevitable. And then with 1 second on the clock, Burton got it done.
The state championship to cap off what was one of the biggest level jumps in the country. And as Cerchio graduates and heads to Cornell, Burton has one year left to now occupy that spot as the hunted, atop the state rankings, and with the only limit the sky.
I know the whole public school, homegrown, anti-recruiting crowd is going to hate this, heck I’m sure they were seething all weekend. Why? Because the finals line up on Saturday was so littered with green you would have thought it was a St Patrick’s Day parade. What are you talking about?
Well, I’m talking about two schools, Delbarton and St Joseph’s Regional, sending a combined 26 of 28 possible wrestlers to Boardwalk Hall, a combined 12 finalists, and ultimately 8 champions between them. That’s 8 champions out of 14. For two schools. The top two schools in the state and they happen to both don green.
The color of growth and prosperity is also the color of envy and let’s just say both meanings are relevant here. Intensively so. On the growth and prosperity side, you have two programs that have been building and racing to the top of the state, throwing some elbows on the way up. I picture siblings fighting over the last chicken leg at the dinner table. Of course, they have to wrestle for it. And they’ve been neck and neck. Last year SJR beat them in the dual for the team state title. This year, Delbarton returned the favor.
But that’s not the entire picture is it? Not everyone is a fan. And most of the non fans, the haters, come from the group of folks tied to public schools. They boo, they chastise, they complain, they try to tear down. They’re like old men yelling at the rain, or better yet the “reign”.
And in this current era, it appears the reign has no end in sight. Well done Green Wave and Green Knights.
Stall. What’s my favorite word? Stall! Why they gotta say it like Short. Now, fans of Bay Area rap legend Too Short will get the reference, others will be utterly confused. Either way, what was clear to me – and I would guess everyone else watching the NJ state finals – was how quick the refs here call stalling.
Now, I’ll admit at first it was a little jarring. You watch wrestling across the country, coast to coast, and you get a sense of match pace or rhythm. You get a feel for how a match is called. And then you get to a state where it’s noticeably not that, and it takes a little to readjust. However, by the last day of action and especially into the finals, I have to say I quite enjoyed it and prefer it.
They didn’t let anyone hang out near the edge. They basically turned what would be a step out in freestyle into a stall here. And it kept the action moving. It kept a good flow. And from my spectator position, it made for better matches all around.
Of course, you had many complaining, and I get it, especially if you’re on the bad end of one of these calls. But as long as it’s applied consistently, I see this as an improvement on the rule interpretation compared to other states.
It should also be noted that in conjunction with the stall calls, they also called stalemate quicker than the average. Again, getting the action going and not letting wrestlers just hang out in positions.
All I can do is hope the trend catches on elsewhere.
Always worth recognizing the seniors graduating on top. And by on top, we’re looking at medalists, not just the champions. In a one division state, finishing top 8 is a feat unto itself.
1st Place: Tyeler Hagensen (Mt. Olive; 113); Matt Henrich (Southern Regional; 157); Vinnie Lee (Delbarton; 215)
2nd Place: Kurt Wehner (Donovan Catholic; 120); Alex Nini (Christian Brothers; 144); Louie Cerchio (Delbarton; 175); Hudson Skove (Rumson; 215); Connor Martin (Delbarton; 285)
3rd Place: Anthony Rossi (Hunterdon Central; 120); Dylan Ross (Paramus Catholic; 138); Auggie Hibler (Leonia; 144); Frank DiBella (St Joes; 157); Connor Scuilla (Hasbrouck Heights; 175); Tyler Bienus (Mt Olive; 190); Collin French (Southern Regional; 215); Brandon Toranzo (Nutley; 285)
4th Place: Ryan Ford (Bergen Catholic; 157); Jacob Zearfoss (Gloucester City; 165); Thomas Brunetti (Hunterdon Central; 175); Dan Rella (Paramus Catholic; 190)
5th Place: Logan Brzozowski (Seton Hall Prep; 120); Nick Balella (Hackettstown; 132); Jack Myers (Morristown; 144); John Quinonez (Paramus Catholic; 165); Ed Terreri (Paramus Catholic; 175); John Wargo (Phillipsburg; 285)
6th Place: Alex Esposito (West Essex Central; 106); Brady Klinsky (Middletown North; 113); Donovan DiStefano (Wall; 144); Jeremy Quezada (Dumont; 150); Logan Wiecoreck (Vorhees; 157); Ethan Mendel (Northern Highlands; 215); Daniel Eylash (Paramus; 285)
7th Place: Zach Reilley (Raritan; 144); Nick Campagna (Christian Brothers; 157); Ben Garcia (Don Bosco Prep; 165)
8th Place: Sawyer Ostroff (Donovan Catholic; 126); Noah Cochman (Bergen Catholic; 138); Nick Villani (Bernards; 144); Jake Wacha (Pascack Hills; 150); Frankie Martino (Passaic Valley; 190); Cole Hughes (Emerson; 215); Lorenzo Portella (Red Bank Catholic; 285)
Based in Western PA. Right in the heart of WPIAL country, Todd brings an insider’s view from the country’s epicenter of wrestling. He’s excited to build on the TKDWN tradition of starting with the story first. The athletes, the coaches, their families and supporters, there is no shortage of stories to tell. And Todd will bring his unique perspective to help us continue to deliver top notch content for the world’s greatest sport!
