Collins to Wrestle for Third Place at PIAA AA State Championships

Hershey — Clearfield wrestler Brady Collins fell one win short of reaching Saturday afternoon’s state final match when he was dealt a 10-7 loss by Wyoming Area’s Aaron Evanitsky in Friday night’s139 pound championship semifinals.

Evanitsky (40-4), last year’s third place finisher at 138 pounds, won on the strength of five takedowns throughout the match. Collins held a 3-2 lead after the first period via a reversal and late penalty point. When the bout went to 4-2 after a Collins escape to start the second period, Evanitsky then scored three takedowns versus two more Collins escapes to take an 8-6 lead into the final two minutes. Evanitsky took neutral to start the third period and upped the bout score to 10-6 with his fifth takedown with a final escape by Collins setting the 10-7 final.

Colins then had to gather himself after the loss and wrestle Southern Columbia’s Mason Barvitskie (28-10) in the fifth round of consolation for the right to go to the third place medal match. Last year’s fourth place state finisher at 132 pounds, Barvitskie was coming off of a 5-0 consolation round four win earlier in the session. After a scoreless first period, Collins, as he had done in his earlier tourney wins, rode Barvitskie the entire second period. Coming off of the bottom in the third period Collins broke the 0-0 tie with an escape with 16 seconds remaining, then gave up an escape with eight seconds left in the 2-1 victory.

The opponent in the third place bout with Collins (38-4) will be the other semifinal loser, Chase Hontz (38-10) of Faith Christian Academy. Both Collins and Hontz are sophomores who qualified for states last year and are picking up their first PIAA medals Saturday in the 2:00 PM medal matches session.

West Branch’s Landon Bainey will wrestle for the gold at 114 pounds and Glendale’s Zeke Dubler will wrestle for seventh.

Complete List of Medal Matches courtesy PA-Wrestling.com:

Finals Matchups/Results