Road to Hershey opens for Tide

The first step in the mythical "Road to Hershey" begins tomorrow with sectional tournaments across the area.


For the Columbia wrestling teams that means a trip to Western York/Adams county area for a Class AA sectional tournament involving nine teams from the York-Adams League, one from the Mid-Penn and Columbia, the lone Lancaster-Lebanon League team. The other L-L Class AA teams are headed to Wyomissing.

This week, the top four finishers in each weight class advance to next week's District Three Class AA championships at the old Hersheypark Arena. Teams competing at Bermudian Springs are the hosts, Biglerville, Eastern, Fairfield, Hanover, Delone Catholic, Littlestown and Trinity. Wrestling begins at 9 a.m., with the finals to begin around 3 p.m., according to the District Three web page.

Columbia has two top seeds in junior Jordon Halter at 135 pounds and senior Marcus Fischer at 285.

Halter, who is 30-2, received a first-round bye and will wrestle the winner of the bout between Damon Baker (21-14) of Bermudian Springs and Alex Randt (15-12) of Fairfield. A finals re-match between Halter and Eastern's Donald Minnier looks likely. Halter pinned Minnier last week in a dual meet.

Fischer, 26-9, faces Kasay Snell of Eastern in the first round. Snell is 8-18. Fischer is also ranked second in District Three according to rankings on PennLive.

Two Columbia wrestlers also drew second seeds. At 125, Derek Zercher, 25-6, is seeded second and will face the winner of the bout between Colby Starner (19-13) of Bermudian or Matt Lauer (2-12) of Eastern. Also seeded second is Nate Warner, 27-6, at 160. His first round opponent is David Zinn, 0-6, of Delone
Other Columbia pairings are:
103: Jeff Carroll, 14-16 vs. Dam May, 29-4, Biglerville.
125: Ezar Bush, 2-10 vs. Wayne Wivell, 24-7, Fairfield.
130: Alec Hooper, 6-24 vs. Barry Lewis, Eastern, 14-10.
140: Josh Elliot, 17-15 vs. Nate Post, Delone, 12-8.
145: Todd Lingafelt, 25-8, vs. Tommy Cassella, Delone, 10-6.
152: John Markley, 15-14 vs. Alex Warner,21-10, Littlestown.
171: Johnny Vazquez, 7-7 vs,. Justin Harrison,15-11, Hanover.
189: Cain Warfel, 14-16 vs. Ryan Vaughn 17-6, Littlestown.
215: Byron Germer, 21-10, vs. Joseph Peet, Delone, 13-10.