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Sandburg grabs title
Precin win nails it down for Eagles in night's final match

By Paul Tokarz
Tribune staff reporter

February 27, 2005, 1:04 AM CST

DeKALB -- With the score 23-23 and the finals culminating with the 125-pound match, Sandburg had what Glenbard North wished it had—a 125-pound individual state champion.

The Eagles' Brandon Precin (48-1), who won the Class AA title the previous week, wasted little time in setting the tone in his do-or-die match against Glenbard North state qualifier Jon Ranck on Saturday.

At 1 minute 20 seconds of the first period, Precin set up a fireman's carry and was awarded an additional point for Ranck's illegal contact to the face.

Precin added to his 3-0 lead in the second period with an escape. The final score was 4-0. Precin rode out Ranck in the final period to give the Eagles (30-1) their first state title with a 26-23 victory.

"I'm able to wrestle my best with the pressure," Precin said.

"If there's one person you want to end it for you, it's got to be Precin," Sandburg coach Mike Polz added.

After beating St. Rita 27-22 in the semifinals, Glenbard North (24-6) was looking for its second upset of the day when 215-pounder Gino Heredia took a 2-1 decision over Sandburg's Cameron Miller. That victory gave the Panthers a 19-13 lead with five matches remaining.

Even the 103-pound match that featured state champion Michael McAuliffe was not automatic for Sandburg. McAuliffe was leading 8-0 heading into the third period when the Panthers' Caitlyn Chase threw him to his back with a headlock.

Had it not been for an out-of-bounds call, Chase might have pinned the champ. But McAuliffe survived for a 9-6 decision.

With his match behind him, McAuliffe was quick to point in his teammate's direction.

"Once we knew it was tied, there was no doubt on our bench we were going to win," McAuliffe said of Precin's match.

Copyright © 2005, The Chicago Tribune

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State Wrestling: Sandburg 26, Glenbard North 23

Precin's late show puts Sandburg over the top

Sunday, February 27, 2005

By Curt Herron
Special to the Daily Southtown

DEKALB — If there's one wrestler Sandburg coach Mike Polz wants to have on the mat with a state championship on the line, it's Eagles junior Brandon Precin.
That's exactly the scenario that unfolded for Polz's Sandburg squad in Saturday night's IHSA Class AA Dual-Team State Championship against Glenbard North at Northern Illinois University's Convocation Center.

Precin, a three-time state placer and this year's 125-pound state individual champion, met Jon Ranck in the final match with the score tied at 23.

Precin got a takedown in the opening period to take control and went on to claim a 4-0 win. That handed Sandburg not only a 26-23 victory, but the school's first state title in wrestling.

"If there's one person you want to end it for you, that's Brandon Precin," said Polz, who also guided Providence Catholic to a state title in 1989. "We were hoping it wouldn't have been this close, but they're a great program.

"You can work as hard as you want, and we have, but let's face it, there's only one thing people remember. You can be one of the top teams in the state — and I think we were many times in the last 10 years — but people look at who won the state title. And we finally got there."

In order to capture the championship, the Eagles (30-1), who were unbeaten against Illinois teams during the season, needed to claim wins in four of the final five matches.

Precin was thrilled to be on the mat for the decisive bout.

"I felt like the team's destiny was in my hands," said Precin, who finished with a 48-1 record in 2004-05. "I felt very confident that if I wrestled smart and didn't do anything that put me in a bad position, I'd win.

"We worked very hard this year. This title is the culmination of all those hard practices. It's easier said than done to become the state champions. We accomplished every goal we had as a team, and this was our last one."

With just five matches remaining, the Panthers (24-6) had built a 19-13 lead.

Sandburg began its comeback at 275 pounds, when Eric Rettke beat Brian Iossi 17-4. The Eagles moved in front 20-19 after 103-pound state individual champion Michael McAuliffe withstood a serious threat from Caitlyn Chase to claim a 9-6 victory.

Glenbard North regained the lead at 23-20 when Danny Monaco defeated Kevin White 10-1 at 112 pounds.

Sandburg's Conrad Polz tied things up again when he beat Mark Schultz 7-1 at 119, setting the stage for Precin's heroics.

The Panthers had struck first at 130 pounds, when Vince Ramos beat Mike Schaffer 13-4.

Sandburg responded with two narrow wins to take a 6-4 advantage. Matt Cusick claimed a 3-1 overtime win over Brian O'Connor at 135, and Mike Anello got a takedown with just six seconds left to beat Jon Isacson 5-4 in a showdown of two state placers at 140.

"Winning the state championship is unbelievable," said Anello, a senior captain. "This feels like nothing else in the world. I'm speechless right now.

"When one guy falls down on our team, the next guy picks him up. That's how our team has been this year."

Glenbard's John Malizzio edged Eric Pretto 3-1 in overtime at 145 pounds before Sandburg's Ben Friedl captured an 11-1 win over Roy Feltson at 152.

The Panthers tied things up when Tony Dieppa got an escape in the second overtime to nip Brett Ambrosino 2-1 at 160.

Glenbard then took a 16-10 lead when Matt Smith pinned Glenn Hurt in 4:51 in the 171-pound bout.

Sandburg's Clinton Polz picked up a 9-3 win over Mike Geanto at 189, but Glenbard countered with a 2-1 win from Gino Heredia over Cameron Miller at 215 for a 19-13 lead.

St. Rita's quest for a third straight state title was derailed in the semifinals when Glenbard North won 27-22 to hand the two-time defending champion its first loss of the year.

St. Rita (25-1) bounced back in the third-place match with a 47-13 victory over Rockton Hononegah (21-4).

"I'm real proud of our kids. That's all I really can say," St. Rita coach Dan Carroll said. "They worked extremely hard this year. We'll get back to work and try to get back here next year."

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History-making season ends for BHS in Elite 8

Purple Raiders fall to Glenbard North

By Randy Sharer 2/27/05
rsharer@pantagraph.com

DEKALB -- Bloomington High School's milestone wrestling season ended in the quarterfinals of the Class AA dual team state tournament Saturday, but it's coaches hope the experience becomes a stepping stone to future success.
The No. 14-state ranked Purple Raiders fell to No. 4 Carol Stream Glenbard North, 36-29, at Northern Illinois University's Convocation Center.

"The kids hadn't been here before," said BHS coach Mark Gardner, whose team ended with a 22-3 record. "It was just the next step. You can't go past this step until you get to this one.

"Hopefully this will be a turning point in the program and they'll be able to see what is attainable."

The Intercity, Big 12 Conference and regional champion Raiders already had attained a lot, reaching the Elite Eight for the first time and advancing a school record seven to the individual state tourney.

But Glenbard North also had seven state qualifiers including three medalists to one for BHS.

"They are flexible enough in their lineup -- they bumped some kids up and that made some real tough match-ups for us," Gardner said.

Glenbard North went on to upset No. 2 Chicago St. Rita in the semifinals, 27-22, before falling to No. 1 Orland Park Sandburg in the final.

Glenbard North's quarterfinal began at 130 where its state fifth-placer, Vince Ramos, pinned Evan Lancaster in 2:21.

Brett Robbins (44-1 at 135 pounds) tied it for BHS by pinning Louie DiGioia in 5:21.

"We knew Brett Robbins was going to be tough," said Glenbard North coach Matt Hahn. "We thought our best shot was to wrestle Louis DiGioia at 135 and bump all our guys up."

The strategy paid off as the Panthers won three of the next four weights, the only loss coming to Gianni Ontiveros (41-8 at 140) in overtime, 6-4.

"I was hoping we would split those matches," said Gardner, who saw state sixth-placer Justin Hale (38-8 at 145) lose to Glenbard North's three-time state medalist, Jon Isacson, 13-5.

The Panthers also watched John Malizzio edge Nick Alvis at 152, 4-2, before Tony Dieppa downed Troy Clark, 17-3, to take a 17-9 team lead.

"They have good kids where we have good kids," lamented Gardner. "They won more of the close ones than we did."

The only other winner for BHS was Brian Temple (39-4 at 215) who notched a technical fall over Reno Manuele, 15-0, to pull the Raiders within 24-14 with five weights remaining.

Glenbard North regained control at 275 as Gino Heredia pinned Luke Maurer in 4:46. Maurer took a 2-0 lead into the final period.

"Luke was going for bonus points for the team," Gardner said. "He was trying to help the team out. He wasn't going to be satisfied just sitting on top for a win. That said a lot about Luke."

Glenbard North's 30-14 lead allowed Caitlyn Chase, the first female individual state qualifier in Illinois history, to wrestle conservatively against Tyler Johnson (41-2 at 103), who had pinned her earlier in the season, but had to settle for a 3-1 win.

"I'm sure that's what her goal was, to keep the match close and she was able to do that," Gardner said. "You get a team down and the team that's down has to go and score bonus points and that changes the whole complexion of the match. She can make you come to her as opposed to an even match-up."

Glenbard North clinched the dual with a pin at 112 and then forfeited the final two bouts.

"We came to compete and we just didn't get it done today," said Robbins, who finished with a school record 176 career wins against nine losses. "I'm proud of us, but just getting here wasn't our goal. We wanted to place."

Next year BHS will return 10 men from Saturday's lineup and four have won sectional titles.

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Top 10 area prep sports moments of the week

Lenny Jurado 2/27/05
El Paso Times

Each week the El Paso Times ranks the top 10 noteworthy high school accomplishments from the past week:

1. Chapin senior Lara Jackson won a pair of gold medals, in the 100-yard butterfly (56.09 seconds) and the 50 freestyle (23.24), at the Class 4A state championships and was named Outstanding Female Swimmer of the Meet. Jackson's time in the 50 freestyle tied a state record and set a Class 4A record. She also led the Huskies' 200 freestyle relay team to a second-place finish (1 minute 41.62 seconds) and the 400 freestyle relay team to a fourth-place finish (3:44.80).

2. The Hanks girls wrestling team finished just 0.5 points behind Amarillo Caprock in the state wrestling tournament, the closest finish in state history.

3. Eastwood senior Tressa Yocum won her second consecutive state wrestling title in the 165-pound weight class, completing two seasons without losing a match.

4. Hanks sophomore Awbrey Lowe captured her first state wrestling title by defeating Eastwood's Cessy Carroll in the 102-pound weight class.

5. Hanks' Jacob Valdez earned a major decision win against Klein Oak's Kody Williams to win the 135-pound state wrestling title.

6. Andress' Tim Burns earned a bronze medal in the Class 4A state championships after touching the wall in the 100-yard breaststroke in 1:00.68. Eastwood's Daniel Avalos was El Paso's only 5A competitor to swim in the state finals and placed fifth in the 500 freestyle (4:38.88) and eighth in the 200 freestyle (1:44.05).

7. Franklin shortstop Michael Provencher signed a national letter of intent to play baseball with El Paso Community College. Provencher batted .472 as a junior and this year was selected by the El Paso Times as one of the top 15 baseball players to watch in the city. Also, Coronado sweeper Megan Wonner accepted a scholarship to play soccer at Eastern New Mexico University.

8. Montwood's boys basketball team dominated Mansfield High 44-27 in capturing a Class 5A area-round playoff championship. Junior Roman Martinez and senior Mike Helton led the way for the Rams with 19 and 17 points, respectively.

9. Parkland senior Dewayne Hall scored 34 points to lead the Matadors past Amarillo Caprock 63-59 in their Class 4A area-round playoff game, Parkland's second consecutive area championship.

10. Fort Hancock outscored Snyder by 18 points in the second half of their Class A area-round playoff game and went on to win 66-51. Moises Morales was the Mustangs' go-to scorer, finishing the night with 33 points.

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Girls Get A Grip
Coed wrestling has its critics, but they aren't on the mat

By Time magazine MIMI HARRISON 3/7/05

Friday-night wrestling at Annapolis High. As in countless other high school gyms, there are mats on the floor, crowds in the risers and bunches of well-muscled teenagers warming up. The wrestling teams from Annapolis and Arundel high schools in Maryland are stretching, jumping, rotating their heads and shaking out their hands. Nicole Woody, 16, is the only girl on either team. It is unclear whether the 105-pounder will get a chance to wrestle this evening. She'll have to see if anyone on the Annapolis squad matches her weight. A female wrestler is still a curiosity, but Woody is no novice, having just returned from Russia, where she competed with the U.S. women's wrestling team.

Wrestling runs in the Woody family the way music may run in yours. Two brothers wrestled, a cousin is on the Annapolis team, and her uncle is one of the coaches. Her other uncles wrestled too. Strict Christians, they are not enthusiastic about boys facing girls on the mat. They think it's immodest, and it somehow upsets their notion that females should defer to males. Her uncles are not alone. Girls who wrestle boys routinely endure heckling, forfeits and what they feel are unfair calls. But Woody, an Olympic hopeful for 2008, will not be deterred.

The advent of women's wrestling as an Olympic event has moved the sport to the élite ranks. The U.S. took two medals--a silver for Sara McMann and a bronze for Patricia Miranda--at Athens in 2004. Women's wrestling is growing in the U.S., where girls have gradually gained access to the mat, thanks to Title IX's gender-parity provision. Schools are required to give the girls a shot with the boys if there aren't enough females or funding for a girls team. And so about 7,000 female students from grade school through college are working out and wrestling against guys.

Parity does not equal popularity, and coed scholastic wrestling remains a contentious issue. For the very young--in some wrestling clubs, coed matches start as early as age 6--it's just cublike fun. As children mature, however, many critics find problems with coed contact. The demands of the mat--raw and primal aggression--seem to go against the qualities our culture instills in girls. And for boys, wrestling against girls seems to contravene the lessons they were taught about not hurting girls and keeping their hands to themselves. Texas and Hawaii ban coed matches in high school, so these two states have the most all-girl teams.

A lot of boys don't mind that division. Terry Steiner, coach of the U.S. Olympic women's team, echoes the common observation that coed wrestling puts boys in a no-win situation. If they win, they lose; they have bullied a girl. If they lose, they really lose; they have lost to a girl.

Girls like Woody insist on having a chance. "It's not always easy to find a wrestling partner," she says. "No one wants a girl." Puberty typically lifts most boys out of her weight class; it also means boys grow exponentially stronger than girls, lessening the girls' chance of winning. But Woody and thousands like her are standing their ground. "I never have to sit out practice because I always make someone practice with me," she says.

Tonight Woody gets a bout. Her head kept low and her confidence high, she matches her male opponent tap for tap and grab for grab, and finally brings him down by the ankles. An American-flag skullcap hides her hair, and it's hard to tell which finely muscled arm is female, which male. The match is scoreless after overtime, but Woody wins by a decision.

Patricia Miranda, the bronze medalist at Athens in the 48-kg class, says her matches against males, which continued through Stanford, were invaluable to her development as an athlete and a woman. Wrestling offers "tremendous benefit for the female population," she says. "Girls learn the value of hard work, accountability and self-worth, things you can't get from magazines, boys or other girls." Although she won just once in her college career, she maintains that the only way for women to gain parity in the sport is through continued access to matches. If that means wrestling boys, so be it. Miranda's aim is to help establish women's wrestling as an NCAA Division I sport. That would enable women to pursue an education and an activity they love--a double blessing for kids like Nicole Woody.

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The Macho Female Athlete: They do Exist
Make it Happen

by: Elizabeth M. Botello
Staff Writer2/28/05

When involved in a sport, an athlete must exude aggression, competitiveness, determination and the will to not give up.

When I think about it, all these traits are often categorized as male stereotypes. Sports have always been, first and foremost, a predominantly male environment.

From bullfighting to wrestling, boxing and basketball, the men wave their flag and claim it their land.

Men, men, men.

Have these “macho” traits, in the process, seeped into the bloodstream of female athletes?

When we have to go into the locker room and suit up in cleats and jerseys, tie our hair back in ponytails and whip the makeup off our faces, do we exchange our feminine characteristics for male ones instead?

From my view it seems to be that way, or at least it makes me think.

The female population has its stigmas, just like the male population. People still believe that females have to be sensitive, emotional and vulnerable. And maybe their favorite color falls somewhere in the pinks and purples.

Well, it’s time to wake up because a lot of us aren’t exactly what you think. Some females are actually more competitive than sensitive. Some females are as hard as steel before they cave into their innermost feelings and let you see the real person behind the façade.

Maybe being an athlete in an environment where macho traits are part of the routine and are expected has led some females to act like this outside the track, soccer and softball fields.

And what if, when we trade in our female qualities for male ones as we take on the role of an athlete, we keep these manly traits after we change back to our normal clothes and walk out of the locker room into our regular lives?

Perhaps being involved in sports has left these characteristics forever embedded in the female athlete race and, in the process, we too have put our “softer” side on the back burner.

But so what?

Now, in the year 2005, women are more ambitious and in control when others expect them to fall apart. Now females are stronger than they and you think. I don’t even realize it at times until someone points it out to me. To be a female and have a few macho traits is not a bad thing.

I believe it gives us an edge over other female subgroups. The female athlete has integrated both her girly and what are called her “manly” qualities into one being: herself.

Perhaps we’re tougher. We can stand up for ourselves more readily. When we fall, we don’t just sit on the ground for hours; we stand right back up. By holding onto these masculine traits, female athletes have taken their toll on other facets of my life and yours.

Maybe it’s a bad thing, maybe it’s a good thing.

Keeping a hard shell around our vulnerable selves can’t last long. Sooner or later we’ll break and shed those tears instead of sweat. Put tears aside and the greatest macho trait we exhibit is the fight in us.

We don’t give up as easily. We strive for what we want. The ability to push ourselves to our greatest potential in sports has pushed us toward our goals and what we want to become.

The world is constantly evolving and so is the female population, specifically the female athlete. In the work force, it will prove extremely useful too. Sports show us how to cooperate with others but also to be independent and rely on oneself. Independence, that’s another one.

So now, I have to applaud the sports world.

Your manly environment and stereotypes have rubbed off on the female athlete.

Not all of the macho traits are sweet as candy, but some do benefit us in the long run. I happen to like the competitiveness and the drive in me to succeed. I like the quiet aggression I put forth to make sure I get what I want in life, and I mean it in a good way, people.

We aren’t all softies for sure. Where do those girls exist?

But then again, I can always switch off or at least dim the lights on my masculine side and turn up the bright lights on my feminine side.

I guess you could say we make the best of both our worlds.