Success at the individual state wrestling tournament is a function of expectations as much as it is about an athlete’s placement on the podium. Of course everyone aspires to be a state champion and no one wants to go home without a medal. The level of satisfaction with a medal from second through eighth depends on the wrestler.

Carson Wagner and Dagen Condomitti both entered this year’s competition in Hershey with aspirations of standing on the top step. Both wrestlers walked away with their highest state finishes, fourth, and both walked away dissatisfied.

Condomitti was 30-1, fresh off winning the Outstanding Wrestler award at both districts and regionals by pinning all 7 of his opponents. His first round opponent, Griffin Gonzalez of Lebanon, was the fourth place finisher from the South Central region and didn’t figure to be in Condomitti’s class.

However, there are no gimmes in the state of Pennsylvania in wrestling and after Condomitti scored the first takedown 12 seconds into the match, Griffin scored the next 11 to drop Dagen into the consolation bracket.

He came back strong on Friday with a pair of first-period pins to secure a medal. He then ground out a 5-3 decision against Dominic Frontino of Shippensburg and a 4-2 sudden victory decision over Kelin Laffey of Pine-Richland to get to the third-place match. There he got nipped 3-1 in SV by Jack Pletcher of Greater Latrobe.

Condomitti summed his tournament.

“I wrestled bad my first day and had to wrestle five matches to place,” he said. “The next best thing was third after I lost the first day, but that’s not what I wanted. I wanted first.”

Wagner’s path was similar.

After a quick pin in the preliminary round, Carson found himself matched up with Williamsport’s Cael Nasdeo, a Penn State commit. Wagner pinned Nasdeo at Top Hat this season, but Nasdeo had beaten Carson 3-1 at last year’s state tournament. History repeated itself as a second period nearfall made the difference in this year’s 3-1 decision.

In the blood round, Wagner secured his third state medal with a 6-4 decision over Nic Allison of Mifflin County, a 4-time state qualifier. In the next round, he gutted out a 2-1 decision in the ultimate tiebreak by riding out Tyler Chappell of Seneca Valley, a third-place state finisher in 2021.

He received a forfeit from Nasdeo in the next round of consolations, setting up a third-place match with Kaedyn Williams, the 2021 state champion at 106. A Williams escape in the second period was the only score.

Despite battling through a knee injury that he suffered in district duals, going through perhaps the deepest weight class, and becoming only the 12th K-Kid to be a 3-time state medalist, Wagner wasn’t totally satisfied.

“One more place up every year, 6th to 5th to 4th,” he said. “Feels good to get another step higher. It’s always about improvement. Even though it wasn’t the best weekend, it wasn’t the worst either. I did … fine.”

While Condomitti and Wagner have another year to shoot for the gold medal, senior CJ Fritz’ Northampton wrestling career came to an end in consolations at the hands of a familiar foe on Thursday night. Fritz faced off with Nazareth’s Nick Foster for the fourth time this season and for the third time lost an agonizingly close decision. This one was by a 4-3 score with the decisive points coming on a third period takedown with the score at 2-2. Foster went on to take fourth place at 145.