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Tigers looking to defend team crown in Howland Invite
HOWLAND
The nine-team Howland Invitational marks its 50th anniversary this weekend.
Howland’s event is the second-longest continuously running high school wrestling tournament in the state.
It was started in 1962 by Bob Irwin, Howland’s first wrestling coach, who started the program in 1955. The Howland Invitational is second to North Canton’s 51.
The first round is 10 a.m. Saturday with finals at 6 p.m.
In addition to host Howland, which has won six straight tournament championships, other teams are Girard, Salem, Liberty, Eastlake North, Cranberry (Pa.), Northwestern (Pa.), Rootstown and Ashtabula Lakeside.
Bill Beasom’s Howland team is led by several wrestlers, including returning champ J.R. Perry, who won at 103 in 2010. Perry placed sixth at state last year at 103, but has been wrestling at both 112 and 119 this season. The junior with a 13-2 record will compete at 119 this weekend.
Robbie Klose (145), Bryce Tricker (160) and Chuck Sayre (215) were runners-up at this tournament last winter.
Ready to go at 285 is Cody Reesman, who missed last season with to a knee injury suffered in football. Reesman was a state qualifier as a sophomore.
Girard was the runner-up team in 2010 and coach Jim Cardiero expects to have wrestlers in all 14 weight classes, including senior Josh Barnes (10-0) at 103, junior Jacob Carpenter (14-3) at 135, senior Aaron Hall (15-2) at 145 and senior Alex Saunders (16-3) at 215.
“These are the top performers to date and they’re the ones we expect to do well,” said Cardiero, now in his 20th season as coach. “We had a real good [Howland] tournament last year and I’d hope to do as well if not better. But we also understand that we’ve got a lot of young kids this year.”
Most recently, Barnes and Saunders won their weight classes at the Leonard Truck & Trailer tournament at Jackson-Milton. At the Leonard event, Carpenter, a state qualifier in 2010, was runner-up to last year’s 130-pound state champion Johnny Matacic of Jackson-Milton.