The Ultimate Warrior Wrestling tournament returned January 24th and January 25th for its 10th year, with this year’s tournament including 46 Pennsylvania public schools. This tournament means more to the community than just the sport of wrestling. David Williamson remarks, “Over all the years we have been blessed with a strong fan base that follows our program each year, and the tournament is just another way to allow our student-athletes to compete on a bigger platform in front of our supporting casts. It gets to be bigger than just the sport itself and ultimately is just great for the community.” Williamson plays a big role as he is the Ultimate Warrior Tournament Director.
West Branch’s head wrestling coach, Jason Bainey explains how much it means to the community by stating, “The Ultimate Warrior Tournament is our only fundraiser every year and is a huge success because of all the support we receive from everyone involved throughout our program and school district. The tournament is very good for the local business, as it brings in many people from across the state who support our area. Many local businesses also compliment the tournament yearly on how much money and business the tournament brings into their local economy. Most teams have to stay in State College and Dubois due to every hotel in Clearfield being completely booked for the weekend.”
The tournament started on Friday at 1:00 pm. The first round to be wrestled was the Round of 64/32. The winners of that round then headed into the round of 16 which started at approximately 4:00 pm. On Day 1, wrestlers in the winners’ bracket moved through the quarterfinals, while those still fighting to stay alive wrestled back through the consultation bracket for a chance at the podium. The tournament started back up for Day 2 early Saturday morning with all of the conseyi matches while the semifinalists chilled out until they wrestled at 11:00 am. When semis ended, the place bout matches for 7th, 5th, and 3rd were wrestled. At the end of the place bouts, the gym was torn down and the format moved to one mat for the finals at 5:00 pm. Thirteen champions walked out of the gym later that night, but only one received the Outstanding Wrestler award. The OW award went to Dalton Perry, a senior from Central Mountain. Perry is the only wrestler to have the distinction of being a 4x Ultimate Warrior Champion. But don’t blink, the tournament will be back in January 2026.
