Leading off today: It's no match for Ali-Frazier, Celtics-Lakers or Britney Spears vs. Christina Aguilera — on second thought, yeah, it is better than two Mickey Mouse Club alums — but this weekend's presumed rematch between two champions will be as highly anticipated as any recent New York high school sports event.
Ian Paddock of Warsaw and Alex Ekstrom of Palmyra-Macedon, seniors who both have three New York State Public High School Athletic Association wrestling championships on their resume, went head-to-head in the Section 5 Division II finals on Saturday at Rochester Institute of Technology.
Paddock defeated Ekstrom, 5-0, for the 135-pound title and the automatic berth into the state meet in Albany. Ekstrom is expected to receive one of the at-large berths into the NYSPHSAA meet.
Paddock got the job done with an escape and a lightning-fast ankle pick in the second period for a takedown, then successfully rode out Ekstrom in the third period. The crowd of 3,000 was swallowed up by the enormous Gordon Field House, but the Paddock-Ekstrom confrontation was the match many had come to see.
"You could tell people were excited," Paddock told the Democrat and Chronicle. "When they called us to the mat, the crowd was pretty loud."
Paddock, an Ohio State recruit, improved to 50-0 this season and 264-6 for his career — unofficially three wins short of the state record. Eckstron, who will attend Oklahoma, is 46-2.
More wrestling: Shenendehowa senior Austin Meys joined exclusive company Saturday by becoming the third Section 2 wrestler to earn five sectional championships.
Meys’ quick technical fall over Ballston Spa’s Chris Ohnsman capped the 189-pound senior's weekend. Meys was a state Division I champ at 171 pounds last year (his second title) and is heading for a presumed showdown with Brockport's Christian Boley, who gave Shen's Hunter Meys a tussle and finished third at 189 last season.
Austin Meys, one of the Plainsmen's four champs Saturday, stands at 259 career victories.
Shen 112-pound senior Luke Popolizio, a two-time state runner-up, also secured a return to the state tournament in Albany.
In Section 4 action, Nick Wilcox of Greene put an end to his long wait. Wilcox was a Division II state champ at 103 pounds in 2006 and a runner-up at 119 in 2007 but was benched for disciplinary reasons last year after clinching a berth in Rochester. On Saturday, he triumphed at 125 pounds for his fourth Section 4 championship.
"I'm so pumped, I'm ready to get back to states," Wilcox told The Press & Sun-Bulletin. "Last year was a big disappointment, I felt I could have won a state title."
In the Section 1 meet, Ardsley's Penn Gottfried earned his fourth championship with a win in the Division II 112-pound final against Croton-Harmon's David Occhipinti. The junior, one of his school's five winners, is on pace for a sectional-record fifth title in 2010; 10 others have won four titles.
"I understand the gravity of what I did," he told The Journal News But I never placed at states all three years," Gottfried said after his pin at 1:45 of the final. "It's kind of comical. I have to do something in my last two years."
Frantic rally: Senior Dave Roberts scored 7:59 into the third period to cap a run of four goals in a five-minute span as Brockport stunned top-seeded Geneva/Waterloo, 5-4, Saturday in the Section 5 Class B hockey quarterfinals.
