Steve Powell tied a hallowed record Friday at the PIAA Class AAA team wrestling tournament, but on the whole he'd rather have waited a day.
The veteran Red Rovers coach won his 468th career match with a 4719 defeat of District 1 runnerup Norristown to move into a deadlock with retired Nazareth legend Ray Nunamaker for most wins by a District 11 coach.
But the fact that it came in a consolation match made it less meaningful as Easton had earlier in the day been ousted from the championship bracket with a 3025 loss to a highly motivated buzzsaw of an http://www.fashionjacket.net/ Erie McDowell team.
"(All the record means) is that I'm old," said Powell, whose career mark stands at 4681033, with a wry smile.
The McDowell loss may have aged Powell some. Easton didn't look sharp, and indeed twice suffered onepoint deductions in bouts for untaped shoes a sign, perhaps, of minds not all being in the right places.
"That's just bad coaching, bad preparation," Powell said. AAA final, forfeited the final two matches.
"That was an awful feeling, losing that match in my senior year and not making the state finals," said Easton senior 120pounder north face jackets on clearance Peter Stanley, who defeated Paul Deitz 52 in a rare highlight for the Rovers in the loss to McDowell (171). "We wrestled terrible, but there was nothing we could do about it (afterward)."
Easton was presented with a conundrum in the upper weights when the Trojans sent formidable Khlique Harris out at 195 with McDowell ahead 63.
"We had seen (Harris) beat the North Allegheny kid (Jarred Lux, 85, in a Thursday match) who we'd seen win the Manheim Tournament, and we thought if we bumped up Tyler (Greene) and Francis (Slover) we'd have a better chance to win the next two," Powell said.
It worked at 220 where Greene scored Easton's only bonus points of the match with a major decision, but the Trojans' Scott Augustine edged Slover 43.
The Trojans then pinned at 106 for a 217 lead and never looked back with stateranked studs such as Nick Gibson (126) and 2010 state champion Steve Spearman (138) still to wrestle.
Easton may have suffered from lookahead disease, but Powell thought not.
"I would hope we never do that," he said. "They should know how to treat each match separately. McDowell won a lot of close ones and they have a lot of statecaliber kids."
But there was little doubt the Rovers have looked a whole lot better.
"It seemed like we were flat," Stanley said. "Some kids' minds might not have been in the right place. We definitely were not at the top of our game."
The Rovers bounced back to dismantle Norristown in the consolations, fueled by four pins, including one by Stanley.
"The best we can get now is third and if that's the best we can do, I'll take it," Stanley said.
"These kids have risen to the occasion so many times, in so many different ways this season. I could never be disappointed in them," Powell said. "This is a great bunch of kids. You can't lose focus on what they have accomplished this season."
District 11 runnerup Parkland was eliminated by Owen J. Roberts, 3627, in a secondround consolation match. The Trojans (205) earlier had defeated District 9 champion DuBois 4023.