Saturday,
December 31, 2011
By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director
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Northern Highlands junior Nick Gravina won his third straight BCCA title with a 6-4 win in the 145-pound final against Rutherford's Mike Paskas. |
SUFFERN – Nick Gravina is chasing history. The Northern Highlands junior is looking to become a four-time BCCA champion, a feat that only five other wrestlers have accomplished and he had a chance for No. 3 in Friday night's 145-pound final.
It got a little dicey in the third period against Rutherford's Mike Paskas, but Gravina's march toward history is still on the straight and narrow after his 6-4 win.
“You can't look at it like you want to win four tournaments in four years, you have to take each match each year one at a time. There is a lot of good competition every year and I had a tough one tonight,” said Gravina, who was tied with Paskas, 2-2, after two periods. “I had to keep the pressure on and I could see him breaking, see him getting tired, when we went out of bounds in the third period and that is when I really tried to turn it on.”
Paskas let Gravina up out of the defensive position to start the third period and Gravina then scored a takedown with just over one minute left to take a 5-2 lead. But with 41 seconds remaining, Paskas pulled off a reversal to cut the lead to one and almost got some back points to go with it. But Gravina scrambled to safety, which is one of his specialties, then escaped with 26 seconds left and avoided Paskas' last ditch takedown attempt to make it three in a row.
“If you get into a scramble with him, Nick has great mat sense and he knows how to end up on top. I see him do it every day in practice and a million times in matches. When he looks like he is on his back, he really isn't because he really knows his positioning,” said Northern Highlands head coach Rick Babbits, who coached one other three-time BCCA champ, Ramsey's Chris Prizzi, and expects to coach Gravina to his fourth one year from now. “Nick is in a league now with about 25 three-timers and I can't see how he won't win it a fourth time if he stays healthy. He looks better now than he ever has, he looks really strong, and his technique is getting better every day. He not only wins matches, he really controls them.”
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