aaaaaThe Wheeling Park Duels was initiated in
1991 over the Christmas holiday. We began with 6 teams from both Ohio and
West Virginia. Over the past 14 years it has grown to be what is believed
to be the largest tournament of its kind in the country. This year there
will be 30 teams competing from 4 states: West Virginia, Ohio,
Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Teams will be placed in 4 pools where every
team will wrestle each team in their pool, giving them 5 matches. At the
end of pool wrestling, the winners of each pool will face each other.
Second place pool finishers will wrestle a total of 9 dual meets in 2
days.
aaaaaWe use 9 mats at all times during the
tournament. Each round lasts exactly 1 and 1/2 hours. The key to this
tournament success is starting each round on time. To achieve this, it is
some times necessary to split a match on another mat to keep things on
time. At the end of the second day, we will have wrestled 1860 individual
matches. We utilize 15 officials from Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and
Ohio.
aaaaaThere have been several winners over the years
with some local teams winning the over all dual meet such as Brooke,
Buckeye Local, and Wheeling Park to name a few. Last years winner (
Parkersburg South ) and runner up ( Martins Ferry ) up will be returning
this year.
Officials
aaaaaOfficials for this year's tournament are: Ray
Marling, Chris Diserio, Rich Heavilin, Dave Harpold, Rick Hillberry, Ken
Mcwilliams, Ray Jefferis, Jason Talyor, Jeff Burns, Barry Gashel, Jerry
Burns, John Holliday, Mike Stalnaker, and Paul Coffland.
aaaaFor further information please call
Steve Shaffer at WPHS at 304-243-0400 or at Home
at 304-232-6972.
