Freedom and Liberty had nearly identical weekend’s at Memorial Gymnasium during the District 11 3A wrestling championships.

Both teams finished neck and neck in the team standings, with Freedom coming in seventh with 101 points and Liberty nipping closely in eighth with 98.5 points.

It was a weekend that both head coaches came away with inspiring results, primarily for the Patriots, as sophomore 172-pounder Jared Karabinus reached the finals.

Karabinus didn’t have enough in his arsenal to shock his way to the title, losing to Bethlehem Catholic’s Luke Thomas by a 13-2 major decision in the finals, but it was an encouraging sign for the Pates hopes of keeping the season alive toward Hershey.

“For him to get into the finals at 172, a man’s weight class, was impressive,” said head coach Dante Terenzio. “We thought he had a chance to do this, but you don’t see many sophomores at that weight get to the finals. He did what he needed to do to get to the finals and that’s just awesome.”

The finals loss was the only one the Pates suffered in the consolation rounds, as CJ Horvath (120, third), Chris Jurado (145, fifth) and Noah MacIlroy (160, fifth) each were able to move on.

Horvath was able to take third following a 3-0 decision over Pottsville’s Connor Demcher, while Jurado avenged a quarterfinal defeat to Parkland’s Juan Moya to eliminate him from the tournament with a 6-1 decision in the consolation round.

MacIlroy kept his season alive with a 6-2 decision over Easton’s Anthony Apgar.

“We won all of our consolation matches, so that was good for us,” said Terenzio. “We aren’t a team that has any superstars, just a bunch of guys that work hard. We’re getting better every year, but we’re happy to move four guys to regionals.”

Liberty had four medalists, but only three advanced to regionals, led by Javien Deleon’s third-place finish at 132.

Deleon lost his first bout of the tournament to Bethlehem Catholic’s Kollin Rath, as the 15th-seeded Rath became a thorn in the seeding process coming into the tournament.

However, Deleon battled back to win his next four bouts in convincing fashion (two by major decision and two by fall), including a 14-0 major decision over Aidan Micheli in the medal round.

“Certainly Javien wanted a district title, but he wasn’t deterred after losing his first match,” said head coach Brandon Hall. “Maybe next week at regionals he can get a rematch with Rath. We’d definitely take another crack at that.”

Ryan Santiago (145) and Christian Reid (160) both finished in fourth place, following medal round losses.

Santiago dropped a 5-1 decision to Nazareth’s Nick Foster, while Reid lost to Parkland’s Adrian Gacek by fall in 3:00.

“I’m really proud of the way this whole team wrestled,” Hall said. “Overall I think we competed and wrestled hard. We had guys that were overmatched, but as a program I’m proud of what they showed. Come out and wrestle hard and you can live with whatever the results are and that’s what we did.”