Bolivar-Richburg Wolverines 46, Portville Panthers 12

Expressway Conference Dual Meet
@ Bolivar-Richburg High School
Wednesday, February 2, 2005

B-R dominates Portville in wrestling
By BRYAN SICK
Wellsville Daily Reporter

Thursday, February 3, 2005

BOLIVAR ― Bolivar-Richburg continued its dominance in the Expressway Conference Wednesday with a 46-12 win over Portville, taking six of the nine matches wrestled and also picking up another three forfeit victories.

Even against the tough Portville squad, the Wolverines depth proved to be the difference as every match was a battle with five being decided by points and two more going multiple periods.

"We know Portville had some tough kids," said Bolivar-Richburg head coach Rich Schubmehl. "I really knew it was going to be a good test for a lot of our guys. The guys really came to wrestle. They showed up well. If you really look at just the matches, I think there were a lot of real good matches. We were fortunate enough to have almost a full lineup, but I'm very happy with the way the guys wrestled tonight."

Two of the Wolverine wins came from boys who were wrestling above their weight as Andrew Taylor made quick work of Brandon Yarnes at 130, pinning him in 1:46, and Matt Appleby earned a 9-2 decision over Ethan Eimers at 135, a match that could have been 9-0 if not for a pair of late stalling violations on Appleby.

"Almost all our guys were bumped up a weight class," said Schubmehl. "All our lower weights were. Matt Appleby was up a weight class, so was Andrew Taylor, so was Dennis Adams. They wrestled really well. I was very pleased with the way they wrestled."

Adams was also very competitive in his match with Matt Burlingame at 140, dropping a 9-7 decision.

About the only thing to go right for the Panthers was Josh Haynes' third-period pin of Travis Dorvit at 152 pounds to close out the dual meet.

Haynes had Dorvit on his back seemingly the entire match, but Dorvit kept his shoulders up until two minutes were up twice before finally going down at the 4:53 mark.

"Travis is a tough kid," said Schubmehl. "Josh is a very good wrestler. Travis is a first-year wrestler and he is a fighter. We have some high hopes for him for the future."

The future looks bright for the rest of the team as well as most of the team will be returning next season.

"We're fortunate," said Schubmehl. "A lot of teams around here don't have quite the depth that we have, the experience and the success that we have right now across the line. Of course we have a lot of juniors on our team, so after next year it could be some tough times for the team if we don't get some new recruits out in the next couple years."

The Wolverines will wrestle in Saturday's Salamanca Invitational, and then travel to Genesee Valley Wednesday before completing their dual meet schedule with a home meet against Jasper-Troupsburg Friday.

"We're looking for some good things for this year and hopefully next year," said Schubmehl. "We just want to take it one match at a time because last year we had a team, we had everyone you see here last year. We only lost one kid and then we got hit with the worst rash of injuries that I've seen as a coach so we don't want to overlook anybody and we just want to take it one match at a time and one tournament at a time."