In just its second year, the St. Louis All Suburban Wrestling Championships has become a highlight of the season.
"It's just a really cool event,'' Hazelwood Central coach Mark Paulsen said. "It's an awful lot of work, and we're fortunate to have a bunch of good people willing to pitch in for us, but this event, because it has so many teams involved and because it involves so many top-quality kids, really has a chance to be something special every year.''
With the addition of Lindbergh and Oakville this year, the two-day event at Hazelwood Central will include all 30 schools from the Suburban East, North, South and West conferences.
Wrestling begins at 5:30 p.m. Friday and resumes at 9:45 a.m. Saturday. The finals are tentatively scheduled for 5 p.m. Saturday. Admission is $5.
With five individual champions, Seckman won the inaugural Suburban title, beating out Northwest and Summit for the top spot.
The weekend should provide plenty of must-see matches. Topping the list is the possible rematch between undefeated 138-pounders David Evans of Parkway North and Nick Olejnik of Lafayette. A year ago, Evans won 8-5 and was voted the tournament's outstanding wrestler.
Other top contenders:
• 106: Seckman's Weston Basler and Ladue's Antonio Escobar
• 120: Seckman's Brock Wingbermuehle and Eureka's Luke Seiler
• 126: McCluer North's Darrell Pamkin and Seckman's Danny Farrell
• 132: Seckman's Matt Kraus, Lafayette's Ryan Jones, Lindbergh's Tom Korenak, McCluer North's Curtis Peebles and Ladue's Grant Sachs
• 145: McCluer North's Josh Taylor and Northwest's J.T. Tuck
• 152: Ritenour's Eric Bowman and Summit's Mitch Mays
• 160: Lindbergh's Michael Slyman, Eureka's Luke Gentry and Northwest's Zach King
• 170: McCluer's Aaron Willis and Parkway Central's Darreal Boykin
• 182: Eureka's Matt McClimens, Seckman's Josh Glore, Fox's Dominic Vitale, Ladue's Chris Shirley and Summit's Rudy Mays
• 195: Parkway North's Chris Carter and Eureka's Luke McClimens
• 220: Northwest's Devin Cagle, Fox's Anthony Reno, Summit's Spenser Matthews and McCluer's Jon Cain
• 285: Parkway South's Donnell Walker, Hazelwood West's Daniel Vaughn and Pattonville's Dylan Hogan
BIG EVENT, BIG PLANS
John Pukala chuckles at the size and scope of the project he and the Hazelwood Central athletic department and wrestling program will take on this weekend.
"It's a mess," the Central athletics director said. "There's a lot of people here."
Pukala estimated the crowd for last year's inaugural event at 1,000, and said, "I expect we might have a few more than that this year."
Fans are just the start of the crowd. The event will have nearly 400 wrestlers and more than 200 coaches, staffers and tournament workers.
The two-day Suburban tournament, with its lineup of 30 schools, is one of the biggest regular-season high school events of the year.
"I'm sure it's the biggest indoor event," Pukala said.
The numbers involved would overwhelm most schools. This tournament couldn't be shoehorned into many other sites. So when Suburban league officials started talking about the tournament, Central was a natural site.
"We have the best gym in the area for this kind of thing," Pukala said.
Despite facing a number of first-time headaches and logistical hurdles, Paulsen, the Central coach, said last year's tournament didn't have many glitches, though the schedule ran later than expected.
"It really ran pretty smoothly for the first time," he said.
The two-day tournament is the result of nearly a year of preparation. Paulsen said hardly a week goes by during the off-season that he doesn't put some time in on the tournament.
"It's always in the back of your mind," he said.
Added Pukala: "We've been having meetings since last year."
No matter how much preparation goes into an event, there are always mishaps. Last year, the biggest problem came as the event was just about to make the turn from the wrestlebacks to the finals. Pukala can still picture the moment when things got crazy.
"Those two heavyweights ran through my scoreboard table and sheared the connections (to the overhead scoreboard)," he said.
Lesson learned. Central will keep its lighted scoreboard table in storage this weekend.
HALL OF FAMER MARTIN DIES AT 71
Fran Martin, the father of St. Charles West coach Craig Martin, died Dec. 27 at age 71.
Mr. Martin coached Parkway Central to the Class AA state title in 1975 and in recent years did most of his coaching work at the youth level. He was inducted into the Missouri Wrestling Association Hall of Fame in 2001 and also is a member of the CBC Alumni Hall of Fame.
FINAL SEASON FOR GAC SPLIT
The Gateway Athletic Conference will hold two tournaments Saturday for the final time, the GAC South at Holt and the GAC North at Fort Zumwalt North. Next year, with the conference going to three divisions, league titles will be determined by duals within each division. In addition, a tournament involving all GAC squads will be held in early January.
"It's never going to be the way it was -- the GAC started in 1979 with five teams, and each team had its own distinct rivals -- but for the fans, I really think this should be pretty exciting,'' Fort Zumwalt North athletics director Ted Hickey said. "St. Charles County has obviously changed a lot since the late 1970s, but I think this is an event that can help promote our sport and give wrestlers throughout the conference a chance to compete against the best.''
"This is something the coaches have wanted since the split," Holt coach Jason Moore said. "It'll be a challenge for the smaller schools, obviously, but one of the strengths of this conference is that every team seems to have a handful of top-level guys who can benefit from another tough tournament.''
Troy and Timberland look like the teams to beat in the GAC South this year. Wrestling at Holt begins at 10 a.m., with the finals tentatively scheduled for 3:30 p.m.
Top contenders in the GAC North include Zumwalt North, Zumwalt South and Washington. First-round action is set for 10 a.m., with the finals at approximately 1:30 p.m.
DUAL EVENT AT LINDENWOOD
CBC and Lindenwood University are joining forces to host the Gateway to the Best Duals this weekend in St. Charles.
The 11-team field includes CBC, Blue Springs, Farmington, Hannibal, Helias and Lee's Summit from Missouri; Belleville West from Illinois; CBC from Memphis; Mater Dei and Merrillville from Indiana; and Trinity from Kentucky.
