RallyNorth.net

No upset this time for Salem vs. unbeaten Owls

Wednesday, January, 23 By Dave Dyer
Staff writer

This was not, said Timberlane coach Barry Chooljian, your typical Timberlane-Salem dual meet.

In a rivalry that witnessed two of the greatest dual meets in area history, a 31-30 Salem win in 2000 that broke a 103-meet Timberlane winning streak in New Hampshire and a 34-33 barnburner in 2003 that snapped a 49-meet Owls' winning streak, you come to expect great meets.

Last night, however, was not one of them, as the undefeated Owls (12-0) whipped Salem, 52-17, in a meet that produced only one close match.

That came at 171 where, in order to get an extra senior in the lineup on Senior Night, Eric Hebert bumped up a weight to defeat Salem's Steve Comtois, 4-1. Comtois had been wrestling 189 much of the year.

"It was pretty nice to win at home in my last time here," said Hebert. "I tried to keep him (Comtois) on his feet and that worked pretty well."

Other than that, Timberlane picked up three forfeits, three pins, a technical fall and a major decision against the struggling Blue Devils (3-5), whose 40-man squad can't fill three weight classes.

"It's been tough," said Salem coach Ryan Carr. "We have 25 kids between 119 and 140 (weight classes) and we just don't have many kids at the upper weights. We're in a down phase right now, but I have no doubt we'll be back. We have a lot of good freshmen."

Salem's only three wins last night came from seniors. Ace Trevor Dearden led off the meet with a technical fall at 125 and classmates Alex Pittera (135) and Corbin Decker (160) both had pins to complete the Blue Devil scoring.

Carr was hoping that another senior, heavyweight Ryan Stanton, could give Timberlane heavyweight Brian Nicoll a battle, but Nicoll won an impressive 13-0 major decision. Trailing 11-6 after three matches, Timberlane narrowed the gap with Dave Clemens' major decision at 140, and pulled ahead for good with a Jarad Smith pin at 145.

Freshmen Matt Morris (112) and Nick Lawrence (130) looked sharp with a technical fall and first-period pin respectively and sophomore Alex Smith recorded a pin at 1:29 for the Owls.

Timberlane will have a much greater challenge Saturday when they wrestle unbeaten Lowell as part of a quad-meet at Lowell High School.