Ben Catullo didn’t look like someone who had wrestled for 61⁄2 minutes when he leaped to his feet and flexed toward the Burrell wrestling team’s bench. After Catullo’s overtime win at 160 pounds, his teammates were happy to celebrate with him Tuesday night at Burrell High School.
Buccaneers heavyweight Ayden Kun also felt the desire to match Catullo’s example.
Kun overcame a six-point deficit to score a third-period pin that helped propel the Buccaneers to a 39-27 win over District 6 runner-up Penns Valley in the first round of the PIAA Class 2A wrestling tournament.
“Ben is the hardest worker I’ve ever seen in my life,” Kun said. “He’s going to break somebody. He’s going to come at you until you have nothing left. That hyped me up to go out and do my job.”
Burrell (15-1) will need to utilize that stamina — plus any other secrets it might have — in the quarterfinals. The Buccaneers will be faced with trying to upset the two-time defending PIAA champion and top-ranked team in the country, District 1 champion Faith Christian, on Friday at Altoona.
“We’re going to battle, and we’re not going to back down,” Burell coach Steve Ansani said. “We’re going to see what adjustments we have to make after the match and continue to train.”
Catullo showed what their training can produce. Trailing by two points to Brayden Lisowski with 47 seconds remaining, Catullo chose to concede an escape.
When Lisowski moved backward, Catullo knew he had a window to operate.
“When I cut him and he started taking those bad shots, they were easy to defend,” Catullo said. “I knew I had to keep going.”
Catullo kept the pressure on and trapped Lisowski along the edge of the mat. He scored the tying takedown in the final 10 seconds of regulation.
When Lisowski tried to regain his momentum, Catullo turned things around with a takedown early in overtime to escape with a 12-9 win.
“Ben took him to deep water, and the guy couldn’t swim,” Ansani said.
Penns Valley opened the match with a 3-0 lead when Zach Rummel won by decision at 139 pounds. The Rams (14-4) lost the next seven matches and fell behind 36-3.
Julian Bertucci tied the match for Burrell by winning by decision at 145 pounds. Calio Zanella (152 pounds), Isaac Lacinski (189), Logan Shank (189) and Kun (285) scored pins during the Buccaneers’ winning streak.
Luke Boylan (215) won by forfeit at 215.
Penns Valley coach Joel Brinker said the Rams had opportunities to apply more pressure to Burrell. Seth Fetterolf gave Zanella problems, even putting him on his back, but Zanella worked his way into a pin.
“We had a chance here, and some matches got away from us, you see the score and it dictates it,” Brinker said. “We had guys on their backs and didn’t capitalize on it. When they got guys on their backs, they capitalized. I thought we were on the outside looking in and thought maybe we could pull one out.”
Burell refuses to let anyone outwork it. Much like Catullo, all the Buccaneers want to be ready to go six minutes.
Kun feels they’ve been prepared to sustain their energy all year.
“The coaching staff,” Kun said. “Our coaches push us until they break us. That helps us break people. Our conditioning is phenomenal.”