Feb 6, 2014 By Mike Dudurich for The 3 min read

This wasn’t the way Jefferson-Morgan wrestling coach Mike Lesko had it figured.

He and his wrestling team traveled to Fort LeBoeuf High School Tuesday night to battle the Bison on their home mat with the winner getting a spot in the PIAA Class AA Team Wrestling Tournament in Hershey Thursday.

But there really wasn’t all that much of a battle. Fort LeBoeuf overwhelmed Lesko’s Rockets, 47-19, ending Jefferson-Morgan’s season at 15-4.

“I really thought we were going to give them a battle, I really did,” Lesko said Wednesday. “It ended up they were the better team. There were three or four matches that we were outgunned in and a couple others we had bonus points slip away and before you know it, it got away from us.”

One of Lesko’s concerns going in was weight management and it turned out to be a factor. His outstanding 113-pounder, Brendan Howard, was four-tenths of a pound over his weight allowance and had to wrestle up at 120.

“He was tied with the kid, 1-1, until the very end and then gave up a takedown,” Lesko said. “That’s one match you don’t figure to lose.”

The Rockets were able to win only four matches: John Demaske at 126, Jason Miller at 138, Ryan Zalar at 170 and Bill Bowlen at 182. Zalar and Bowlen were wrestling up one weight from where they normally wrestle.

“Fort LeBoeuf was very well-prepared and I thought we were, too,” Lesko said. “I had a little bit of a problem with us having to wrestle in their gym, but they finished second in their district, we were third in ours. It wasn’t an intimidation thing, but I think it would have helped to have been at a neutral site.”

In the end, Lesko believes there was one definite factor in Tuesday night’s loss.

“I thought we wrestled pretty good, honestly,” Lesko said. “And they’re a well-coached team, you can tell that. But we left our match at South Fayette, no doubt about it.”

Lesko referred to the heart-breaking 37-29 loss to South Fayette last Friday in the WPIAL Class AA semifinals. It was a match the Rockets had in their hands, but let slip away.

“But there’s nothing we can do about that now,” he said. “We had a great season. All of our kids pretty much improved over the course of the year. Now we have the section tournament next Saturday and I believe we have a handful of kids that can do really, really well in the postseason.”