This weekend brings our area the Class AA Southwest Regional championships once again in Altoona, which is rapidly becoming the wrestling hub in central and western PA.

The brackets will hold 17 qualifiers: eight coming from the WPIAL (District 7), six from District 6 and three from District 5. The top six in each weight class will move on to Hershey’s Giant Center for the PIAA championships on March 9-11.

Todd Warner reports Norm and Todd Brown will be broadcasting the regional Friday sessions on the Eagle Ambassador site. On Saturday, Steve Miller and Todd Warner will do likewise. Wrestling starts at 3:30 p.m. on Friday afternoon. You must purchase tickets electronically.

BEA, who won the District 6 Class AA team title with 201.5 points to Huntingdon’s 158, will send eight qualifiers including three District 6 champions: Lucas Fye (121 pounds), Coen Bainey (127) and Cal;eb Close (172).

Also qualifying were runner-up Cameron Dubbs (172); fifth-placers Jeffre Pifer (152) and Gage Gardner (215); and sixth-placers Alex Surovec (139) and Mason Reese (145). All three District 6 champs — Fye, Bainey and Close — are the top seeds. The tournament can be followed on Flo Arena.

Bellefonte sends seven. They had no district champs, but did get two third-place finishers in Gage Long (145) and Addison Shawley (189). Additional qualifiers are Cameron Garcia (fourth at 114), Ezra Swisher (fourth at 121), Jackson Long (fourth at 127), Noah Weaver (fourth at 139) and Max Murray (fourth at 152).

Sugar Valley’s Kyle Stahl made Sugar Valley history by becoming the first wrestler to qualify for regionals. The 215-pounder will wrestle Mason Woodward of Troy in a pig-tail bout at the Class AA Northeast Regional in Williamsport. The winner will face second-seeded Seth Ross of Lackawanna Trail.

Wrestling lost two great ambassadors this past week when longtime coach at Reynolds Neal Lineman and District 11 (mostly Easton) Ed Ferraro passed. They were truly promoters of the sport.

Central Mountain grad Nik Miller won the Zingo National Open at 197. Representing Hofstra, he defeated Chase Long of Drexel in the finals, 10-4. LHU’s Dashawn Farber and Ethan Miller also took part in that event.

Congratulations to State College for capturing five Class AAA Northwest Regional titles. It was the first time in the school’s storied history to have that many champions. And for the second weekend in a row, Central Mountain with great team balance won the regional team title, finishing 5.5 points ahead of State High (145.5 to 140). Shikellamy was third, Mifflin County was fourth and Selinsgrove was fifth. Williamsport was eighth and Jersey Shore 12th.

The Wildcats had one champion in Luke Simcox, as he dominated the 133-pound weight class. Runners-up were Dalton Perry (139), Griffin Walizer (145) and Gino Serafini (160). Battling back for thirds and a trip to Hershey were Rocco Serafini (189).

Each Wildcat in the tournament contributed to achieving the teams title. Giovanni Tarantella (215) placed fourth, just missing the cut. Hat’s off to Luke Ananea who was there with the team rooting them on, Look for him to be a big part of the 2023-24 squad.

Also same to Braylen Corter for continuing to workout with this state-bound teammates. People notice.

The PIAA official pairings will come out Sunday.

All-state football player Hadyn Packer, making the drop to 189, was solid winning the Class AAA Northwest title. Teammate Tyler Bauder wrestled back to grab thir at 172. He also achieved his 100th win during his run. Good luck to all our area wrestlers and coaches at states.

Congratulations to Doug Buckwalter for his induction into the District 4 Wrestling Hall of Fame. His long and storied career as a wrestler and coach makes him revered across the state. Coach Biff Walizer is fortunate to have Bucky as an assistant.

Coach Walizer has an all-star coaching staff including Steve Krouse, Dylan Caprio, Mike Brown, and Richie Thompson.

Dale Franquet, the coach at Midd-West, was also inducted. Many of you know Franquet by his daughter being an outstanding member of the Clinton girls’ softball team. Dale made news a couple years ago when he was attacked at his prison guard job and unfortunately lost an eye.

The Coleman excellence in wrestling continues in York Suburban High School as Steve and Beth Coleman’s grandsons both took third in their sections and wrestle this weekend for a trip to Hershey. Brothers Gehret (133) and Brayden (145) Gentzyel competed in Section 4. Also, speaking of area greats, Barry Daniels’ grandson Reece Daniels will represent Bermudian Springs in the 133 class in the Class AA Southeast Regional tourney at Freedom in Bethlehem.

He placed fourth in districts. The sophomore has a 28-10 record. Paul Conklin, former Class AAA Northwest Regional director, tells me Reece is also grandson of Gale Love, former wrestler for LHHS in mid 60s.

On the girls’ front, SanctionPA, which has held an informal state championship since 2020, has fine tuned their format and will include four qualifying tournaments to be held on March 5 with the top 5 placers qualifying for the states to be hosted by Central Dauphin HS on March 12.

Milton High School is our local area host (Northeast Regional) which includes Districts 2, 4 and 6. Kiski Area will host the Western Region Tournament (Districts 7, 8, 9 and 10), Parkland the East Regional (Districts 1, 11 and 12) and Penn Manor (Millersville) the Central Regional (Districts 3 and 5).

Sierra Chiesa (Northwestern) won the District 10 Class AA Championship at 107 and is No. 2 seed in Class AA Northwest Regionals.

She joins Lake-Lehman’s Lexi Schechterly as the most prominent female wrestlers in the PIAA. The latter has the No. 1 seed in the Northeast Regionals to be held at Williamsport High this weekend.

The Big Ten conference championship gets underway Saturday at the Crisler Center in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

All 14 conference schools will participate in the championships with the first-round, quarterfinal semifinal and wrestleback matches taking place during Sessions I and II Saturday.

Action continues Sunday with consolation semifinals and seventh-place matches getting underway during Session III and the first-, third- and fifth-place matches highlighting Session IV.

For the third-consecutive year, the Big Ten Network and B1G+ will offer live linear and streaming coverage of all four sessions at the Big Ten Wrestling Championships. Linear coverage on the Big Ten Network is also available on the FOX Sports app.

LHU will be trying to defend their championship at the MAC Conference Tournament this Friday and Saturday at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.