Clarion Area’s Brock Champluvier Finishes Fifth At Pennsylvania Junior Wrestling-Junior High Championships (03/03/20)

(Photo submitted) L-R: Coach Rosco, Brock Champluver, Kaden Ferguson, Coach Weber

Clarion Area’s 252 pounder, Brock Champluvier – took home the fifth place medal at the Pennsylvania Junior Olympics 2020 Junior High State Tournament, held Saturday, February 29th and Sunday, March 1st, at the Cambria County War Memorial in Johnstown.

Clarion Area Junior High Head Coach Lee Weber shared this article.

Brock dominated the Area V tournament a few weeks ago, but he still had some doubters due to his low number of wrestling bouts.  Even though he was 15-0, there were others with twice the number of matches. 

Brock did not wrestle the first half of the season, due to his large size.  He was well over 30 lbs over the maximum weight for Junior High.  I tell you this, not to embarrass Brock, but to show you how dedicated he was (with mom and his family’s help) to lose this weight in less than 2 months, through hard work and commitment.  This alone was a huge accomplishment!  

Being the Number One seed from Area V, Brock earned a bye in the round of 64 (1st round).  In the round of 32, he faced Ethan Hoffman of Governor Mifflin and pinneded him in 1:04!  In the round of 16, Brock faced the Number One seed from Area VIII, Joe Pituch of Union City and won by decision 5-2.  Brock gave up the initial takedown, but escaped immediately and controlled the match the rest of the way with his under hook series.

This win propelled him into Sunday morning’s Quarterfinal match against Area XI Number One seed Ian Scully of Central York.  After a 0-0 first period, Brock smothered his opponent in the second period and held him down for the whole 1:30.  In the third, Brock exploded for an escape and spun around for a takedown and later in the period, to win 3-0. 

In the Semifinals, Brock was two seconds away from holding down Joe Enick of Penn Trafford in the second period and fell behind 1-0, going into the third.  Brock was moving well and almost earned an escape, but got caught pushing back from the bottom and lost by fall. 

Losing in the Semi’s is always tough to bounce back for the next match.  Even though he lost in the last two seconds of the match to Andrew Semmel of Kennett 3-1, Brock was the aggressor the whole  whole match.  This hurt him because he thought he was the better wrestler. 

Brock had to regroup for his last match for the fifth place position.  He was facing Mike Mazurek of Sharon, a wrestler that had beaten the wrestler Brock had just lost to. Once again, Brock was the aggressor, pushing his opponent all over the mat and holding him down the whole second period.  His opponent already had a stalling call and in the third, he received another, giving Brock a 1-0 win and a well earned fifth place finish in the State! 

This tournament included both AA and AAA schools!

I would like to thank Coach Rosko for his help throughout the year with our Junior High team and also a special thank you to Coach Slike, for working out with Brock the last few weeks to prepare him for this great run!  And I also would like to thank Josh Beal and Jake Smith for working out with Brock and Kaden Ferguson during the Junior Olympic season! 

Kaden qualified for the State tournament at 82 pounds.  He was undersized for his weight class, but he showed no fear in wrestling much more experienced wrestlers!  Kaden has the right attitude and with a couple years of training, he will create his own success story on the mat!

(Brock is a student at Keystone and Kaden is a student at Clarion-Limestone. Thanks to Coach Weber for this article and Clarion Wrestling for the photo. CONGRATULATIONS, BROCK AND KADEN!!!!)