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<p>HERSHEY &#8212; Five wrestlers from District 2 entered the PIAA Class 2A Championships this week looking to make some history.</p><p>They weren&#8217;t hoping for this type of history.</p><p>For the first time since 1997, D2 wrestlers left the Class 2A state wrestling tournament on Friday without dressing a medalist.</p><p>There were certainly opportunities, as four of the five started Friday morning&#8217;s session in contention for a medal by winning a match the day before. But while the second day of the tournament has usually been brutal for District 2, this was more devastating than previous seasons.</p><p>Meyers&#8217; Colin Pasone (113 pounds) and Scranton Prep&#8217;s Thor Balavage (220), an Avoca resident, started Day 2 with quarterfinal bouts, but they both lost twice on Friday and were eliminated.</p><p>After getting off to a good start in his quarterfinal bout, Pasone made a mistake in the third period, and couldn&#8217;t regroup in his next match looking not like himself and was eliminated.</p><p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve been here. We know what the game is, he knows what the game is and you either come down and wrestle the full time as hard as you can, or you&#8217;re not gonna get the result you want,&#8221; Meyers coach Ron Swingle said. &#8220;The problem with not giving your best effort is you have to live with it. If you get beat &#8212; and some days you just get beat &#8212; that&#8217;s fine. Some days that guy&#8217;s just better than you.</p><p>&#8220;But when you don&#8217;t put forth your best effort, you don&#8217;t really find that out. I&#8217;m just disappointed that he just didn&#8217;t bring anything. It wasn&#8217;t his A-game. It wasn&#8217;t his B-game. &#8230; Against both of those kids, there&#8217;s no reason we should&#8217;ve have lost either of those. It&#8217;s disappointing. I&#8217;m very disappointed.&#8221;</p><p>Pasone held leads of 2-1 after the first period and 4-3 entering the third against Bronson Garber from Upper Dauphin in the quarterfinal bout. Pasone chose down to start the final period, and Garber tried locking up a cradle two times and was unsuccessful. The third time was a charm and he got it locked up tight to pin Pasone with 34 seconds remaining in the period.</p><p>&#8220;He was trying to prevent a loss instead of gain a win and he got caught,&#8221; Swingle said. &#8220;But we know down here if you don&#8217;t stay in your offensive points, it&#8217;s very hard to win. We just weren&#8217;t too explosive on bottom there and it got away.</p><p>&#8220;That one we can take some positives away from, but this last one, I don&#8217;t know. It&#8217;s gonna take me a while to get it out of my eyes. I&#8217;ll have to burn it out or something. I want to forget that one as best I can.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;That one&#8221; would be Pasone&#8217;s final bout, two hours later against Richie Markulics from Notre Dame Green Pond in the third round of consolations, also known as the blood round, looking to secure a medal with a win.</p><p>Markulics was awarded a takedown with two seconds remaining in the first period to take a 2-0 lead. He then escaped to start the second and go ahead 3-0. Pasone got an escape of his own in the third period just 20 seconds in, but Markulics danced around, avoided a takedown and won 4-1. Pasone also gave up a point on a caution in that bout, as his season ended with a record of 39-5.</p><p>Even though he improved on his previous showing from a year ago, the junior will try to regroup now and work to get better for his senior season.</p><p>&#8220;You can take away some positive things if you compete at 100 percent. I don&#8217;t think there&#8217;s anything you could take away from that last match,&#8221; Swingle said. &#8220;There&#8217;s not one thing you can build on, personally. It&#8217;s a match that you go home, burn the tape, try to forget about it and don&#8217;t ever go back and visit it again. It was that ugly.&#8221;</p><p>Balavage, who won the Northeast Regional Tournament last weekend, didn&#8217;t have wasn&#8217;t in matches that were any easier.</p><p>In his quarterfinal against Ethan Budd from Port Allegheny, Balavage lost 8-1 to drop into the loser&#8217;s bracket. That&#8217;s where he lost to Gage Gladysz from Greenville, 5-2, and was eliminated. The Prep senior, who was also an All-State football player this season for the Cavaliers, never got in a good rhythm against Gladysz.</p><p>After a scoreless first period, Gladysz escaped in the second and worked a takedown. He also got a takedown in the third period after Balavage chose neutral trying to score points.</p><p>Balavage ends his career with two District 2 championships, two appearances in the state tournament and a school record 119 victories. Scranton Prep remains without a state medalist in its program&#8217;s history.</p><p>&#8220;I guess someone else will have to get prep&#8217;s first state medal. @IvanBalavage thanks to everyone for everything. &lt;3,&#8221; Balavage posted on Twitter after his loss.</p><p>The 2A state tournament was also cruel to the Benton/Northwest program, which was coming off a Northeast Regional team championship. Three of the Tigers&#8217; five wrestlers were in the quarterfinals on Friday morning, but all three lost including 113-pound senior Alan Diltz, who finished third in the state a year ago.</p><p>Four of Benton&#8217;s wrestlers earned their medal later in the day with the most impressive coming from 170-pounder Jeremy Walsh. The senior was trailing by five points late in the third period before hitting a cement mixer and sticking Reynolds&#8217; Joel Leise with just 33 seconds remaining in the bout to secure a medal.</p><p>The medals the four from Benton will receive will be decided on Saturday afternoon.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Meyers&#8217; Colin Pasone gets caught in a cradle in the third period of his 113-pound bout against Bronson Garber of Upper Dauphin in Friday&#8217;s PIAA Class 2A Wrestling Championships in Hershey. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/web1_Pasone1.jpg</photo0><caption0>Meyers&#8217; Colin Pasone gets caught in a cradle in the third period of his 113-pound bout against Bronson Garber of Upper Dauphin in Friday&#8217;s PIAA Class 2A Wrestling Championships in Hershey. </caption0><photoCredit0>Ed Boardman | For Times Leader </photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/web1_Balavage.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Thor Balavage of Scranton Prep battles Gage Gladysz of Greenville during their 220-pound bout at the Class 2A PIAA Wrestling Championships in Hershey Friday. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/web1_Balavage.jpg</photo1><caption1>Thor Balavage of Scranton Prep battles Gage Gladysz of Greenville during their 220-pound bout at the Class 2A PIAA Wrestling Championships in Hershey Friday. </caption1><photoCredit1>Ed Boardman | For Times Leader </photoCredit1></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/web1_Pasone2.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Colin Pasone of Meyers works to take down Richie Markulics of Notre Dame Green Pound during their consolation bout at 113 pounds in the Class 2A state tournament on Friday </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo2>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/web1_Pasone2.jpg</photo2><caption2>Colin Pasone of Meyers works to take down Richie Markulics of Notre Dame Green Pound during their consolation bout at 113 pounds in the Class 2A state tournament on Friday </caption2><photoCredit2>Ed Boardman | For Times Leader </photoCredit2></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Dave Rosengrant</p><p>drosengrant@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta><p><strong>PIAA Wrestling Championships</strong></p><p><strong>Saturday&#8217;s Schedule</strong></p><p><strong>Class 3A</strong></p><p>Semifinals and fourth round consolations, 9 a.m.</p><p>Fifth round consolations, 11:30 a.m.</p><p>Parade of Champions, 6:45 p.m.</p><p>Finals, third, fifth, seventh place matches, 7 p.m.</p><p><strong>Class 2A</strong></p><p>Parade of Champions, 1:45 p.m.</p><p>Finals, third, fifth, seventh place matches, 2 p.m.</p><p><strong>TV:</strong> Both finals can be seen live on PCN</p></factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Dave Rosengrant at 570-991-6398 or on Twitter @tldrosengrant</p></shirttailMeta></div>

District 2 goes medal-less at 2A state wrestling tournament for first time in 20 seasons