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Happy birthday to Mia Elizabeth Cipriani!

Ladies of Charity host Annual Day of Enrollment

<p>HERSHEY &#8212; Jimmy Hoffman waited his entire wrestling career to get to the final of the PIAA Championships. </p><p>The wait for the Hazleton Area junior, who started wrestling 10 years ago, was over on Saturday night as the 132-pounder reached the championship bout of the Class 3A tournament.</p><p>He fought and battled, never stopped moving and trying until the final buzzer sounded, but it was too hard to overcome. Hoffman was defeated by Bethlehem Catholic&#8217;s Joey Gould, 3-0, in the championship bout in a match that consisted of some controversial officiating.</p><p>Still, the junior who had to battle through the bracket all weekend entering as the No. 4 seed from the Northeast Region and having to wrestle a preliminary round bout, won a silver medal, the first medal he&#8217;s grabbed at the event in three appearances, with one more year to achieve the ultimate prize.</p><p>&#8220;I&#8217;m bumming a little bit right now knowing I was that close to getting to the top of the podium,&#8221; Hoffman said. &#8220;Thank God I&#8217;m only a junior because I still have next year and this gives me something work for next year. To keep going, keep working hard in the offseason and I just wanna get back here next year again and hope to get another shot at the title.&#8221;</p><p>After a scoreless first period, Hoffman chose bottom to start the second. After trying multiple times attempting to escape, he got turned for what seemed like less than a one count, but the match referee called two back points. Normally, a wrestler needs to be on his back for two counts to get called for two back points. That gave Gould a 2-0 lead to start the third.</p><p>&#8220;It is tough to take. He wrestled his match every match of the tournament. Unfortunately he couldn&#8217;t wrestle his match here in the finals but I don&#8217;t think that was a fault of his own. I think that was dictated by other people that were on the mat,&#8221; Hazleton Area coach Keith Maurer said. &#8220;We wrestled well. We can&#8217;t blame anybody else. Still gotta come out with more points than the other guy. I&#8217;m extremely proud of the kid. It&#8217;s a tough pill to swallow because you accomplish so much, and second&#8217;s a great place, but it&#8217;s tough.&#8221;</p><p>Hoffman let up Gould about 30 seconds into the third period to try to attack and get a takedown and back points of his own being down 3-0. But for just about the entire time, Gould kept backing away. Hoffman took numerous shots, but couldn&#8217;t get anything because Gould either got out of bounds on the attempts or fended them off. The Bethlehem Catholic senior didn&#8217;t get called for stalling until approximately 20 seconds remained. At that time, it was too late.</p><p>&#8220;You just gotta stay after him,&#8221; Hoffman said about the final 90 seconds of the match. &#8220;I had to do something so I kept shooting straight in and pushing him back, hoping to get another stall call. It&#8217;s hard. I couldn&#8217;t get any tie-ins, so I couldn&#8217;t get any angles. So I had to shoot straight in and was hoping maybe to get lucky and maybe something would happen and I could capitalize on it.&#8221;</p><p>Hoffman became just the third state finalist in school history joining state champion Nate Eachus, who won in 2007, and Gary Kaschak, who was silver medalist in 1981. Hoffman beat Council Rock South&#8217;s Zack Trampe, who was ranked first in the state and 10th in the country, 5-3, in the semifinal to advance to the state title bout.</p><p>The Cougar became the second straight state finalist for the Wyoming Valley Conference a year after Wyoming Valley West&#8217;s Cody Cordes finished as runner-up in the Class 3A tournament. The WVC remains without a state gold winner since Eachus and Lake-Lehman&#8217;s Scott Davis both won in 2007. District 2&#8217;s last champ was in 2010 when Abington Heights&#8217; Evan Craig (Class 3A) and Lackawanna Trail&#8217;s Eric Laytos both won gold.</p><p>In a fast-paced semifinal bout where both wrestlers were constantly moving, Hoffman wanted to get a quick takedown and took numerous shots in the first period, but couldn&#8217;t get the two. In fact, Trampe actually got the initial takedown and led 2-1 after one.</p><p>&#8220;He just had a lot of movement and he ended up taking me down he&#8217;s just phenomenal on his feet and was tough to score on,&#8221; Hoffman said.</p><p>In the second period, Hoffman started on bottom. After rolling around for most of the period, the Hazleton Area standout grabbed a reversal with just 9 seconds left to open a 3-2 lead.</p><p>Trampe chose bottom to start the third, and Hoffman let him up about 30 seconds in. With time winding down and both wrestlers on the mat, Hoffman got around Trampe for the takedown with 20 seconds remaining and held on for the victory in a rematch if a bout held at the beginning of last season won by Trampe, 2-1.</p><p>&#8220;We do scrambling drills that help me and I was able to get the two at the end but that was it,&#8221; Hoffman said.</p><p>Abington Heights&#8217; Nick Carr lost his 160-pound semifinal bout to Kaleb Young from Punxsutawney, 13-4. Carr then won his next bout and wrestled for third place on Saturday night where he faced Joshua Stillings from Pennridge and won 6-2 to claim the third-place medal.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Hazleton Area assistant coach Jim Hoffman, right, congratulates his son and wrestler Jimmy Hoffman following his 5-3 semifinal win in the 132-pound weight class during the Class 3A PIAA Wrestling Championships in Hershey at the Giant Center Saturday. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/web1_hoffman6-1-1-1.jpg</photo0><caption0>Hazleton Area assistant coach Jim Hoffman, right, congratulates his son and wrestler Jimmy Hoffman following his 5-3 semifinal win in the 132-pound weight class during the Class 3A PIAA Wrestling Championships in Hershey at the Giant Center Saturday. </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_hoffman2-1-1-1.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Hazleton Area&#8217;s Jimmy Hoffman used a 5-3 decision over Zack Trampe of Council Rock South during their 132-pound semifinal bout to advance to the state finals Saturday morning at the Class 3A PIAA Wrestling Championships in Hershey at the Giant Center Saturday. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/web1_hoffman2-1-1-1.jpg</photo1><caption1>Hazleton Area&#8217;s Jimmy Hoffman used a 5-3 decision over Zack Trampe of Council Rock South during their 132-pound semifinal bout to advance to the state finals Saturday morning at the Class 3A PIAA Wrestling Championships in Hershey at the Giant Center Saturday. </caption1><photoCredit1>Ed Boardman | For Times Leader </photoCredit1></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Dave Rosengrant</p><p>drosengrant@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Dave Rosengrant at 570-991-6398 or on Twitter @tldrosengrant</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Hazleton Area’s Jimmy Hoffman claims silver medal at PIAA Wrestling Championships