Burrell wrestling set for difficult nonsection match with Waynesburg

By: HSSN Staff
Thursday, December 21, 2017 | 6:28 PM

Burrell cruised to its 100th consecutive section victory Wednesday with a 78-0 rout of Summit Academy — the Bucs' second consecutive shutout in Section 3-AA (B) competition.

But the Bucs, ranked No. 1 in WPIAL Class AA, will get a big step up in competition Friday when they travel to face Class AAA No. 3 Waynesburg in a nonsection match.

“We're always trying to seek out the best competition we can,” Burrell coach Josh Shields said. “I think going down the stretch to postseason team (and) individual, our philosophy at Burrell is you wrestle top competition throughout the entire year, and that exposes some of your weaknesses you need to improve on. You can make those types of changes before February, before March.

“If you're not going out there wrestling the best competition day-in, day-out, some of those areas might not get exposed until the postseason, and by then it might be too late.”

Play-by-play from the Burrell-Waynesburg match will be broadcast here on the TribLive High School Sports Network.

Burrell also was scheduled to wrestle Class AAA No. 4 Hempfield earlier this week, but the match was postponed. Shields hopes for a makeup in January. The Bucs also will square off with Alle-Kiski Valley rival Kiski Area, the top-ranked team in Class AAA, in January.

Doug Gulasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at dgulasy@tribweb.com or via Twitter @dgulasy_Trib.