Cradles, arm bars, half nelsons, power-half nelsons, a body press or two.
Phillipsburg High School’s wrestling team threw just about every pinning combination in the book at visiting Sayreville on Monday.
And as the final score suggests, the Stateliners success rate was mighty high.
Phillipsburg racked up eight falls to overwhelm the visiting Blue Bombers 58-9 in in the quarterfinals of the NJSIAA North 2 Group 4 tournament.
“There were some mismatches, but they also put some solid kids out on the mat, too,” Phillipsburg coach Dave Post said.
The top-seeded Stateliners (12-1), ranked No. 5 in the state by the New Jersey Wrestling Writers Association and sixth in the lehighvalleylive region, advance to Wednesday’s sectional semifinals, where they’ll host No. 4 Woodbridge, a 45-18 winner over No. 5 Scotch Plains-Fanwood. The Stateliners are looking for their 36th sectional crown in the 38 years of the tournament.
Junior standout Brian Meyer set the bar early by pinning Aaron Bartlett in a lightning-quick 8 seconds in the second bout of the night at 152. Meyer’s fall, which followed Jayson Zinsmeister’s 35-second opening-bout pin at 145, was two ticks off the all-time program record of 6 seconds, set by former Stateliners standout and current Centenary College head coach John Garrigues in 1997.
Sayreville (13-10) entered the match as decided underdogs as the eighth seed in the NJSIAA’s new expanded format.
“One thing you want to see from the team is them going out there and being aggressive,” Post said. “Obviously, extending the tournament one more day, you don’t want to get any injuries. I thought we wrestled all right. Some things to work on, obviously. But we’ll do that.”
Sophomore Travis Jones almost matched Meyer by flattening Scott Mish in 13 seconds at 113 pounds. State runner-up Robert Melise also got in the act, body pressing Benedict Arthur in just 53 seconds at 220. Tyris Manley pinned Ralph Feola in 56 seconds at 120.
Drew Horun (195), Cullen Day (106) and Cody Harrison (126) also pinned for the Stateliners.
The Blue Bombers got decisions from Corey Knoth at 160, Mike Porcaro at 285 and Trevor Mastoria at 132.
Porcaro (30-1), the fourth-ranked heavyweight in the state by NJ.com, used a second-period escape to squeeze out a narrow 1-0 decision over P’burg’s Justen Carabello.
“I was really happy for Justen,” Post said. “That’s one of the top heavyweights in the state and he held up well. He held position well. We had him take neutral (in the third period). He was giving up so much weight there. We didn’t want to put him underneath there. But that was a big confidence builder for him.”
Mastoria (23-6) used a big 5-point move in the first period to build a lead and defeat Kyle Tino 11-4.
“Kyle got caught out of position in the first (period) that led to that 5-point play and then he had to try and make ground up,” Post said. “But once he made the adjustments, he wrestled (Mastoria) even. And he had a great third period, but you can’t get behind like that.”
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