Brothers Ben and Joe Miller couldn’t be more different on the wrestling mat.
“Ben is very linear,” Liberty coach Brandon Hall said. “Joey is very abstract, all over the place. But they both have an incredible work ethic.”
Hall made a similar comparison to the Hurricanes’ performance through the Bethlehem Holiday Wrestling Classic in late December to a month later, which culminated Wednesday with their sixth consecutive victory, 40-26 over Freedom at Joseph J. McIntyre Gymnasium.
“[We’ve progressed] quite a bit from the holiday tournament to where we are now,” Hall added. “But that’s the plan, to peak toward the postseason. I think that we’ve made that effort as coaches every year to get them there.”
Hall, however, is not surprised at the development of his young team because he said it is a collection of hard workers who have done whatever is asked of them this season.
He expressed his belief in this Liberty team after a loss three weeks ago to Easton when he told athletic director Fred Harris that the Hurricanes were going to make a second trip to Freedom for Saturday’s District 11 Class 3A team tournament.
At the time, the Hurricanes were well outside the top eight in the district’s power ratings. The top eight advance and are seeded later this week by a committee for the tournament.
They now sit at No. 7 with a 13-5 record that includes a 5-0 performance at last Saturday’s Quakertown Duals that was preceded by a 3-1 mark at Virginia Duals.
“We believe in them as a staff,” Hall said. “They know that. Even though we got kind of beat up [earlier this month] by Emmaus and Northampton, they are undeterred. It stinks to lose that way, but they just came right back in the next day, took the critique and worked to get better.
“That’s what we’ve been doing for the last month. I think the Virginia trip is really healthy. It pulls us together. It gets them to see where they’re at outside of District 11, which is always important.”
Liberty won eight of the first 10 bouts Wednesday against Freedom (7-9) to build a 40-10 cushion before the Patriots won the last three.
The Hurricanes allowed only three takedowns in flurry to start the match. Seven of those eight were won by bonus points. Joey Miller’s 5-4 decision at 114 was the only six-minute grinder of the night. He held off fellow freshman Jack Scanlan in the final 75 seconds despite a few scrambles.
Liberty freshman Joey Miller was the recipient of the Daniel P. McIntyre Award as the outstanding wrestler in the annual match with rival Freedom. (Tom Housenick/The Morning Call)
Miller was the recipient of the Daniel P. McIntyre Award as the match’s outstanding wrestler.
“I was surprised [by winning the award],” he said. “But I’ve put in the work. I knew it was going to be a dogfight. Jack is pretty tough.”
It was brother Ben Miller whose 16-0 technical fall at 133 finished off Liberty’s fast start.
Freedom, which will not qualify for the district dual tournament, will use the next three weeks to get healthy and fine-tune things on the mat before the individual postseason.
“We have a couple guys who have been consistent,” first-year head coach Tyler Greene said. “Sometimes this season I’ve questioned the effort. I don’t think it was a question of effort for us [tonight]. I think we wrestled tough.
“The bright spot is that we’ve got three weeks to go home and get focused for districts. I don’t like when people say that we’re young or green. Yeah, we have young guys but a lot of these guys have been wrestling. But from the beginning of the year when we had some of these guys who didn’t even know how to warm up right and putting the good stuff in their bodies to now where [the captains] are taking ownership of the team. I don’t know where we’d be without those captains.”
The four captains produced four of Freedom’s five wins Wednesday. Dan Schiffert, one of the state’s top 285-pounders, got a first-period pin before Liberty won the next five in a row.
Sam Kurtz then got a fall at 139 for the Patriots, followed by Anthony Crisafulli’s pin at 145 and Nick Lyden’s major decision at 152 in the final bout.
Liberty girls also looked strong Wednesday in its 62-12 win over Freedom. Senior Ellie Rumbalski, a two-time District 11 medalist who had one of eight pins for coach Brian Burzynski’s club, was named the outstanding wrestler of the match. She led Freedom’s Charlotte Sampson 4-3 late in the third period before getting a takedown and securing the fall in 5:49.
Rumbalski was Liberty’s lone finalist in last weekend’s EPC Girls Wrestling Championships. The Hurricanes had six medalists and finished fourth in the team race behind Parkland, Nazareth and Emmaus.
It was the third consecutive win in the series for Liberty (6-2) against its city rival.
EPC finalist Jedah Canty (130) and Alexis Horvath (142) had pins for coach Jeremy Ortiz’s Patriots (6-6), who were 12th in the team race.
Liberty 40, Freedom 26
107: Max Milia (L) pinned Anthony Haas, 0:56
114: Joe Miller (L) dec. Jack Scanlan, 5-4
121: Elijah Heimbach (L) tech. fall Shane Getz, 15-0, 3:32
127: John Solano (L) tech. fall Michael Messa, 20-3, 4:28
133: Ben Miller (L) tech. fall Lucas Ellis, 16-0, 4:53
139: Sam Kurtz (F) pinned DeSean Knight, 2:39
145: Anthony Crisafulli (F) pinned Elijah Williams, 1:18
152: Nick Lyden (F) maj. dec. Ben Reid, 13-5
160: Daniel Rivera (L) maj. dec. Dominick Aurin, 11-2
172: Marvin Rodriguez (F) maj. dec. Ethan Estojak, 11-3
189: Ben Jabron-Cruz (L) pinned Thomas Crisafulli, 3:37
215: Anthony Martin (L) pinned Jose Mendez, 1:50
285: Dan Schiffert (F) pinned Jason Doughty, 1:18
Referee: Jason Hartranft
Girls: Liberty 62, Freedom 12
100: Emma Frisch (L) pinned Aubrey Simmavath, 1:58
106: Leila Matejcek (L) pinned Leilani Matias, 3:00
112: Sadie Sedlock (L) by forfeit
118: Angelique Carvalho (L) pinned Ava Wickemeyer, 4:35
124: Eva Trujillo (L) maj. dec. Lilliana Nelson, 15-2
130: Jedah Canty (F) pinned Kendra Cressman, 2:59
136: Kierha Castillo (L) pinned Heaven Binstead, 3:03
142: Lidia Whistleon (L) pinned Emma Lewis, 2:49
148: Alexis Horvath (F) pinned Leena Cruz, 3:14
155: Amilex Bernardini (L) maj. dec. Jaslin Plaza, 8-0
170: Aniahlee Rotger (L) by forfeit
190: Ellie Rumbalski (L) pinned Charlotte Sampson, 5:49
235: Sydney Johnson (L) pinned Ny’Zaiah Wyman, 0:43
Referee: Jake Cole
Senior writer Tom Housenick can be reached at thousenick@mcall.com
