Magical ride continues

(Photo by Chris Bradley).

The Elizabethtown wrestling team's dream season continued last night, as the Bears stormed from behind to beat Lampeter-Strasburg and capture their second straight Section Two championship. The win came less than a week after E-town won its first-ever Lancaster-Lebanon League team championship, marking the first time in school history that the team had won league and section titles in the same year.

The atmosphere at last night's match was probably the most electric out of any E-town wrestling match I've ever attended. The fans were absolutely fantastic (with the exception of the guy in the front row who was screaming at L-S' coach to sit down. There was really no need for that, the guy was just arguing for his wrestler. Coaches do that all the time and there's nothing wrong with it. The fan should've kept his focus where it belonged – on the mat. Let the coach do his job). OK, now that I'm down from my soapbox...seriously, the crowd was awesome, and believe me, the wrestlers noticed. After the match, I interviewed Adam Zellman, Shane Rosenberry and Sean McMullen (who is pictured above, by the way), and when I asked each of them about the crowd support, they couldn't help but smile. Great job by the E-town fans.

And you can't say enough about the resolve of this E-town group. The Bears were in a 23-4 hole at one point before Zellman jumpstarted them with a pin at 160. McMullen was completely dominant, getting to wrestle closer to his actual weight at 189 and earning a pin in 20 seconds. Rosenberry bumped up to 215 and was noticeably smaller than L-S' Chris Eldredge, but he wrestled with the energy and passion that he has all season and got a pin.

Also, Alex Kirchner did an amazing job to beat Teddy Force in triple OT. The crowd was going BESERK on that one. What a fun match to watch. If they were at their natural weights, I'd bet that Rosie, McMullen and Kirchner would all be 189 pounders, and darn good ones at that. But it just shows the unselfishness of this group that they are willing to wrestle wherever they are needed and give the coaching staff and their teammates 100 percent for every single match, no matter how much weight they are giving up.

Congratulations to the Bears, who will have to wait until Sunday for District Three to announce the team tournament brackets. I'll try and post them as soon as I get them, but you can visit the district's web site for yourself if you choose. Just follow the link on the right hand side of this page.