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Penn State Wrestling/Coaching Staff Matches Video Vault

oldcougar65 said:
These guys have something in common. Both transferred after their Sophomore year to other schools and were forced to sit out their Jr years. Of course, both won states their Sr yr, too. Dziewa transferred from Pennsbury to Council Rock South and Pennsbury wouldn't sign off on the transfer. His dad was a D1 champ from Pennsbury, too .
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Josh's dad, John, was a D1 North champ, but lost to Brian Campbell in the SE Regional finals the next week.

Still a very sore spot for me, as John beat my brother in the D1 North finals the week before. John and my brother had wrestled 3 times before in the last year (my brother was 2-1 against him) and they knew each other very well. John didn't shoot at all, but was great from the front head and he tried to bait you into it. My brother was better than him on the mat.

Through the first two periods, John took no shots and my brother wasn't taking the bait and the ref - can't remember his name, curly red-hair built guy, decided he was going to force the action and called 3 double stalling calls against them.

In the 3rd my brother got what should have been the match winning TD. To John's credit he did escape with under 30 seconds to go which wasn't easy.
Of course, on John's first half-shot of the match with 15 seconds left, the ref decided to call a stall against my brother which was now a 2pt penalty because of the progression. John won the match without taking a real shot or getting a TD (besides the desperation one he got off my brother's attempted throw with under 5 seconds to go).

The next week my brother dropped a tough one to Campbell (PA 3rd) 7-4 in the opening round, and then had the misfortune of catching Sam Mantegna (PA 5th) the next morning when they didn't have 2nd day weighins and got sent home. Mantegna was a huge 32 and had gotten upset on Friday night after weighins. Meanwhile John cruised on the easy side of the bracket to the finals before getting beaten pretty soundly by Campbell.

Still sticks in my craw 35 years later, although I have laughed about it with John over the years a few times up in Hershey. Nothing worse than a ref that decides to make himself part of the action.
 
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matter7172 said:
In the days before the internet, Iowa Public Television was the go-to for wrestling. They covered not only Iowa, Iowa State, UNI but also national events like National Duals. They also sold VHS tapes of a lot of events. Gibbons and Johnson were the announcers for IPTv. I wouldn't say they are dinosaurs, but the new order has to be shocking to them.

Other than IPTv, Channel 39 used to broadcast Lehigh home matches (they were also carried on Channel 33 in Hershey). That was about it for wrestling television coverage.
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dicemen99 said:
Josh's dad, John, was a D1 North champ, but lost to Brian Campbell in the SE Regional finals the next week.

Still a very sore spot for me, as John beat my brother in the D1 North finals the week before. John and my brother had wrestled 3 times before in the last year (my brother was 2-1 against him) and they knew each other very well. John didn't shoot at all, but was great from the front head and he tried to bait you into it. My brother was better than him on the mat.

Through the first two periods, John took no shots and my brother wasn't taking the bait and the ref - can't remember his name, curly red-hair built guy, decided he was going to force the action and called 3 double stalling calls against them.

In the 3rd my brother got what should have been the match winning TD. To John's credit he did escape with under 30 seconds to go which wasn't easy.
Of course, on John's first half-shot of the match with 15 seconds left, the ref decided to call a stall against my brother which was now a 2pt penalty because of the progression. John won the match without taking a real shot or getting a TD (besides the desperation one he got off my brother's attempted throw with under 5 seconds to go).

The next week my brother dropped a tough one to Campbell (PA 3rd) 7-4 in the opening round, and then had the misfortune of catching Sam Mantegna (PA 5th) the next morning when they didn't have 2nd day weighins and got sent home. Mantegna was a huge 32 and had gotten upset on Friday night after weighins. Meanwhile John cruised on the easy side of the bracket to the finals before getting beaten pretty soundly by Campbell.

Still sticks in my craw 35 years later, although I have laughed about it with John over the years a few times up in Hershey. Nothing worse than a ref that decides to make himself part of the action.
Click to expand...
I kinda take exception to "John cruised on the easy side of th bracket". He beat Marple-Newtown's Battersby in the quarters easily. Battersby was a national champion as an 8 year old Bantom. Went downhill from there.
In the semi's, Dziewa beat Marc Petroski, who was one of my wrestlers, 5-3, hardly a thrashing. Later Petroski took Ray Brinzer into the 3rd period tied 9-9 in the state semi-finals. So he was no slouch. His brother and his nephew were state finalists.

Brian Campbell was a headhunter of the first order. He was always a chancy wrestler, who could get caught because his balance was a bit questionable. He made to the state finals, getting decked by Tom Best in a headhunter shootout.
Sam Mantegna was from Chichester. For one brief moment in their history, Chichester had a good wrestling team. Mantegna was a 2x place winner, and they had a few other guys qualify for states in that period. Since then? nada.
 
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oldcougar65 said:
I kinda take exception to "John cruised on the easy side of th bracket". He beat Marple-Newtown's Battersby in the quarters easily. Battersby was a national champion as an 8 year old Bantom. Went downhill from there.
In the semi's, Dziewa beat Marc Petroski, who was one of my wrestlers, 5-3, hardly a thrashing. Later Petroski took Ray Brinzer into the 3rd period tied 9-9 in the state semi-finals. So he was no slouch. His brother and his nephew were state finalists.

Brian Campbell was a headhunter of the first order. He was always a chancy wrestler, who could get caught because his balance was a bit questionable. He made to the state finals, getting decked by Tom Best in a headhunter shootout.
Sam Mantegna was from Chichester. For one brief moment in their history, Chichester had a good wrestling team. Mantegna was a 2x place winner, and they had a few other guys qualify for states in that period. Since then? nada.
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Pretty sure Petroski was a soph or something like that that year, and no where near the monster he became yet. Yes, Campbell was a headhunter of first magnitude, his 5 pointer was the difference in his match with my brother, who was a bit of a headhunter himself but made the mistake of going big with Campbell. He scored from top later in the match but it was too little too late.
 
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dicemen99 said:
Pretty sure Petroski was a soph or something like that that year, and no where near the monster he became yet. Yes, Campbell was a headhunter of first magnitude, his 5 pointer was the difference in his match with my brother, who was a bit of a headhunter himself but made the mistake of going big with Campbell. He scored from top later in the match but it was too little too late.
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Yes, Marc was just a very good wrestler as a Soph. Over the next year or so he put on 30 pounds of muscle mass and then was a certifiable monster. He was scary.
 
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