Brian Courtney Makes History
Saturday afternoon at Hershey’s Giant Center History was made
There have been 12 wrestlers that have won four state titles. But no one in the 79-year existence of the PIAA Wrestling Championships accomplished what Brian Courtney did this weekend. Courtney became the first wrestler in history to beat three state champions in the same bracket to wear gold. The Athens junior downed Central Cambria’s Max Murin 3-2 in Saturday’s Class 2A 126-pound final. Courtney earned the opportunity to complete this march with a Friday to remember. He defeated Bedford state champ Jonathan Gabriel and Reynolds gold medalist Cole Matthews by a combined score of 17-6. It put Courtney in the finals against Murin. Murin pushed the action in the second period. He took a shot and latched on to a single. Courtney used his flexibility to split, break his opponents grip and get around the back for a 3-0 lead. Murin escaped to close the gap to 3-1 at the end of two. He added a second escape with 1:28 left in the third and kept coming after Courtney. With time running down, Murin was in on another shot. Courtney wowed the crowd with another split to fight off the move and get his hand raised over a state champion for the third time in two days. “They were all super tough,” he said. “Gabriel was a five-point move, but it was 3-3 before that. I was 4-2 with Matthews before the last period, and Murin was 3-2 at the end.”
This article was submitted to us by Darnel Ginger, a Bjj coach at Martial Arts School Harrisburg, PA