2008 Woodie Awards
Wrestling thumps underdog Saints in first ever common hour meet
By Travis Pickens
Rocket Contributor
Issue date: 12/2/05 Section: Sports
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The Rock, a Division I school for wrestling, handily beat the Saints, 40-3. North East forfeited two matches, 165 and 184 pounds, costing the team 12 points. The school, which is located on the New York border just north of Erie, also lost three matches via major decisions. Only one Saint, Mike DePelligrini, took home a win.
But what you wouldn't know, unless you did research, is North East's coach, Chris Elliott, was the interim coach at SRU for the 2001-02 season and compiled a 7-6 record. On top of that, Elliot was one of current SRU coach Derek DelPorto's roommates while attending SRU.
"No, not really," DelPorto said of the chance he may have some bragging rights after his team's win. "We're friends. He's got a tough job there and he has to recruit and do well. I think what he's doing is great. He's doing a great job there."
The Rock set the tone for Thursday's reunion early. Chris Clark, at 125 pounds, opened the competition with a pin fall 1:06 into the match against David Kelly. From there, SRU (2-3) won its next two matches via major decisions before DePelligrini beat Shawn Baglio, 10-5, at 149 pounds.
"It's real tough," Elliott said of facing a Division I school. "They have three national qualifiers on their team. When you have that many D-I national qualifiers on your team it makes a big difference."
Despite the different levels the schools compete on, DelPorto said he didn't take the Saints (1-1) lightly.
"I got what I expected, but I didn't underestimate them," DelPorto said. "Junior colleges tend to get underestimated when it comes to sports. The only difference between these athletes at the junior colleges and us is that (our wrestlers) met academic standards to get into a school like Slippery Rock."
Elliott said there is no lack of talent on his squad.
"I have about three guys that are D-I caliber," Elliot said. "At this point, they wrestle for me because of academic reasons alone."
Jerimiah Frederick put the exclamation mark on the Rock's win with his 14-2 defeat of Art Moss at 174 pounds. Frederick's win was accentuated when he slammed Moss to mat with 1:19 left in the third round. Moss remained down, apparently with the wind knocked out of him, for a number of minutes before returning.
