In his three years of wrestling at Emmaus, Emilio Albanese has accomplished a lot.
He’s won 112 of his 127 matches.
He’s won a Northeast Regional title.
He finished fourth in the state in his freshman year and as a sophomore he did one better by placing third.
The one thing the Hornets junior didn’t have on his resume was a District 11 champ.
Until this past weekend.
After settling for a pair of runner-up finishes the past two years, Albanese, the No. 1 seed at 127 with a 33-2 record, claimed the gold medal he had been searching for as he knocked off defending state champion Nicholas Salamone of Easton 4-2 on Saturday night at the 75th Annual PIAA District XI Class 3A Individual Championships held at Liberty High School.
He becomes Emmaus’ first district champ since Caden Wright in 2017-18.
“Emilio winning his first district championship after finishing runner-up the last two seasons checked a box on his to-do list,” said Hornets head coach Jim Best. “His weight class was deep with talent, including his finals opponent who is the returning state champion and defeated him in the district finals two years ago.
“Throughout the tournament, he maintained a high pace of activity in the neutral position balanced with savy shot selection. Even though he has been wrestling at an elite level for a long time, his progression in the last few months is resulting in incremental separation from his toughest competitors, and that showed in his semi-final and finals match.”
Albanese trailed heading into the third period of his finals match, but used a takedown to rally for the victory, his first against Salamone in three tries.
Fellow junior Teagan Caciolo, along with senior Xayden Sallit and brother sophomore Xyler and senior Jackson Max all advanced to this weekend’s Northeast Regional Tournament back at Liberty after top finishes in their respective weight classes.
Nine others did not make the cut for Emmaus, which placed seventh as a team.
“From a team perspective, we advanced 11 of the 13 wrestlers into the second day of tournament competition, which is an improvement from last year,” said Best, “However, we were striving for a higher team place finish, so moving ahead, striving to place higher than seventh as a team.
“We matched the number of wrestlers advancing to the regional tournament (five) from last season, so, like the team place finish, moving forward, advancing at least six will be the goal.”
Albanese classmate, Caciolo, reached the finals for the first time in his career at 121 but had to settle for a runner-up finish after falling 8-1 to Bethlehem Catholic’s Nico Emili.
“Teagan battled through a close semifinal match (vs Kade Pascoe of Whitehall) to gain his first district tournament finals appearance, and in the finals match, one situation that didn’t go his way turned a 1-1 match into an 8-1 match,” said Best. “With a few slight adjustments, a rematch with that opponent can have a completely different outcome.”
Caciolo (28-5) improved on his placement from the previous two seasons after placing fifth last year and third in his freshman campaign.
The Sallit brothers – Xayden (172) and Xyler (160) – also battled their way back through the consolation rounds to finish third in their respective weight classes.
Xayden, who finished second a year ago at 172, defeated James Hopkins of Whitehall 4-2 in his third place match and Xyler, after falling 4-2 to Dom Tunison of Nazareth the eventual champ in the quarterfinals, won four consecutive matches capped off with a 13-3 major decision over Carter Chlebove of Northampton
Senior Jackson Max (139) also had to battle his way through the consolation round and wound up taking the fifth and final spot at regionals after a 2-1 ultimate tie breaker win over Jared Santilli of Parkland. A year ago, Max finished fourth at districts and eighth in the state at 107.
“Both Xayden and Jackson suffered hard fought championship round losses but each of them responded by tapping into their veteran experience to battle through their respective wrestle-back bracket, advance to the regional tournament and themselves an opportunity to earn a return trip to the state championship tournament,” said Best.
The other Emmaus wrestlers that competed in the tournament but did not qualify for regionals include Andrew Gerken (107), Levi Max (114), Logan Maher (133), Tommy Fallstich (1450, Aiden Bayard (152), Logan Armstrong (189), Chase DeCesare (215) and Logan Roth (285).
Notre Dame Green Pond won the team title with 219.5 points, followed by Nazareth (208), 3. Northampton (190.5), 4, Easton (165.5) and Becahi (162.5)
Up next will be the AAA Northeast Regional Tournament, which gets underway on Friday. The top five will advance to the PIAA State Tournament in Hershey on March
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