Big shake-up at top of wrestling rankings
Just when you thought you might have some of this figured out, a major bombshell occurred last week that resulted in a shake-up in The Trentonian’s State Wrestling Rankings.
In a stunning result when you consider the margin of victory and the way it which it was accomplished, Warren Hills completely ambushed Phillipsburg, 35-15, Friday night.
As a result, Phillipsburg has dropped from No. 3 in the state to No. 9. Warren Hills, meanwhile, is now in the eighth spot since its first victory over Phillipsburg in 32 years in front of an overflow and ecstatic home crowd in Washington.
The initial logical assumption among many was Phillipsburg must have been missing some starters. After all, just six days earlier the Stateliners had rolled to the championship of the Hunterdon/Warren/Sussex Tournament with five individual champions. Warren Hills was a distant second at the same event and already had losses to Mt. Olive and North Hunterdon on its record.
None of that meant a thing on Friday as a Phillipsburg team with five tri-county champions incredibly was able to win only three bouts against the Blue Streaks. Two things stood out in a match in which Phillipsburg was completely outwrestled after Warren Hills had printed up “Beat the Burg” t-shirts.
For openers, P-Burg got hammered on its feet as
Warren Hills built up a 22-1 advantage in takedowns while sweeping the first 10 bouts. The Liners were also terrible in the down position as time after they were ridden in the third period.
A big part of getting out from bottom, of course, is how much do you want to get out. As the match progressed and it quickly became apparent P-Burg was not at its best, you couldn’t help but recall how it used to be when “Slick” Rick Thompson was its coach.
Thompson never lost to Warren Hills and was considered a master motivator. You can be sure in a match like this he would have gathered the team behind the bench after the second or third bout and read his wrestlers the riot act.
For what it’s worth, Thompson did express an interest in returning as the P-Burg coach following last year’s sudden firing of coach Dave Post in a bizarre development that need not be rehashed here. Suffice it to say, because Thompson had already been fired three times at Phillipsburg, a fourth go-round was not going to happen.
Anyway, it was a glorious showing for Warren Hills, which wrestled a perfect match and had the satisfaction of beating the Liners following a spat between the two programs that resulted in the schools not wrestling the previous two years.
Only a cynic would suggest the reason Warren Hills wasn’t on the P-Burg schedule for two years is because Post could see this coming.
Only a cynic would suggest this was sweet revenge for the Warren Hills wrestlers who ended up at Phillipsburg, including the well-documented time the Liners had a Cornine in their lineup despite the fact his brother was still wrestling for Warren Hills.
When you throw in the unmerciful beating North Hunterdon gave Phillipsburg two years ago in sectionals, these are two of the worst New Jersey beatings for P-Burg in a long time.
Phillipsburg will attempt to rebound on Wednesday against North Hunterdon, which lost in the finals of the Newton Duals on Saturday to Howell after narrowly beating South Plainfield in the semis. You kind of get the feeling it will be a much different P-burg team this week.
As for Warren Hills, it will be at the Jack Welch Duals at Moorestown this upcoming weekend. Teams in that field also are Delbarton, Delsea and Howell.
Warren Hills’ victory over P-Burg further stamped the Streaks as a threat to win its first group title since 1997. The main competition for the Streaks on that front figures to come from South Plainfield and Delsea.
In other words this is the big chance for Warren Hills, which has been greatly aided by the addition of assistant coach Marty White. A state champion for the Streaks, White is the one common thread in Warren Hills’ last two wins over P-Burg because he was on the 1990 team.
In addition to Phillipsburg moving down
six spots and Warren Hills joining the top 10, the other major move in the rankings was Howell climbing to second in the state.
No doubt about it, Howell just really has it going on right now. The Rebels have only a handful of seniors in their lineup and reportedly have well over 100 wrestlers in its juniors program with plenty of more help on the way.
Furthermore, can you imagine how strong Howell would be if a couple of its quality youth wrestlers hadn’t opted to attend parochial schools.
As mentioned last week, Group V is going to be really good. While Howell will be favored to win Central Jersey against Hunterdon Central, it will get trickier for the Rebels from there.
You have to figure Phillipsburg will rebound from Friday’s debacle and the probable South Jersey final between No. 1 Kingsway and No. 4 South at this point looks difficult to call.
Keep an eye on the point totals because teams will be hoping to avoid some very long road trips for the group semifinals on the Friday night before the Sunday finals at Franklin High School.
An example of how this could come into play occurred on Saturday when Delaware Valley lost to Kittatinny by one point in a battle of two of the Group I sectional favorites. This could prove to be particularly damaging if DelVal has to wrestle Paulsboro (quite possibly on the road) in the semifinals as a result of the loss.
AREA UPDATE
With the exception of the Hunterdon County teams, the sectionals have not been kind to area teams. Hamilton and Rich “Southern Man” Gildner’s Robbinsville teams are the only Mercer County teams to ever reach groups and Burlington County hasn’t fared much better.
Cinnaminson did win a Central Jersey Group I title in 2015, but prior to that you have to go all the way back to Dennis “The Menace” Smith’s 1992 Delran squad to find a Burlington public school sectional champ. Coached by the legendary Russ “The Magnificent” Minuto, Lenape won two South Jersey Group IV titles in the 1980s.
The reason we bring this up is Shawnee and Northern Burlington are looking more and more like the teams to beat in South Jersey Group IV. Shawnee is undefeated and just posted a thrilling win over a tough Rancocas Valley team that is headed for a major Burlington County Scholastic League collision with arch-rival Northern Burlington on Feb. 1.
Jule Dolci’s Northern Burlington team is also
undefeated and on Saturday
will be at Brick Memorial, which defeated Hunterdon Central over the weekend. Prior to the Memorial match, NBC will be at Robbinsville this Friday night.
On the subject of Robbinsville, it will host Hopewell Valley a week from Tuesday night in a key battle for Colonial Valley Conference supremacy. A breakdown of that match as well as a look at the Mercer County Tournament on Jan. 29 will appear in next week’s column, but right now it appears Hopewell-Robbinsville could very well be a 7-7 split.
This could change if Hopewell can hit the mat with a full line-up, including the return of 165-pounder Alejandro Lopez from a shoulder injury.