This Saturday is the Presidents’ Athletic Conference wrestling championship, and for head coach Ron Headlee his focus is winning this weekend even through injuries, expectations and wrestlers changing weight classes.

“This has been our goal ever since [we were picked to win],” said Headlee. “It’s never easy when you’re picked to win it, but we have had some injuries to deal with and I think guys have stepped up and tried to fill in and done a great job of that. It’s still our goal to win it but you never know what can happen.”

This season has seen many wrestlers go down with injuries, including sophomore 197-pounder Ken Burrs and freshman 174-pounder Caleb Baxter, who are key wrestlers who have missed time with injury throughout the season. Those two will be available this weekend and Headlee is excited to see a majority of his team coming together at the right time.

“I think we are as healthy as we’re going to get right now,” said Headlee.

Last week the team missed some key opportunities at the John Summa Invitational to finish and Headlee was not happy, but he said will live with the results.

“We lost a couple matches where I wasn’t happy about our effort heading into the third period, we didn’t get the job finished I wasn’t happy about that, but overall I was happy,” he said.

Although there is a lot of importance this Saturday, this is an opportunity for a couple guys to start working and building towards nationals, according to Headlee.

“We’re not goanna change anything, we’re goanna keep working the way we have [been]—working hard,” said Headlee. “We need to do [what we have to do] to get us ready for winning. For guys that have high aspirations of making it to nationals this should be a stepping stone, they need to win these tournaments to make it to nationals.”

In the actual matches, Headlee wants to just keep pace and continue to score through matches to set up winning the match.

“Each team has some strong kids that are going to be tough to beat. [We] might not beat their top guy, but we need to at least get to the finals and score points,” said Headlee. “We need to score points at every weight class.”

The 165 and 184-pound weight classes are where the Jackets have struggled all year because of injury complications. This weekend in the tournament Headlee sees his guys having the opportunity to come out and play great.

“165 is the weight we think we can win at and I think we are as good as anybody at 184,” said Headlee. “We haven’t had a lot of wins [overall], but in the PAC, we are as good as anybody.”

This will be the final time for senior 125-pounder Tristan Buxton wrestling in the Rudy Marisa Fieldhouse. For Buxton, he has faced a lot of doubt throughout his career, but has turned into a great wrestler. For Headlee, he has seen the odds Buxton fought against to become a great wrestler and man.

“Tristan [Buxton] came in and a lot of people doubted he might be good in the practice room for you and help good guys out, but he showed he can wrestle with the best of them,” Headlee said. “He’s proven himself and he is a great person in and out of the room and that’s what I like the most about him—he’s so good with others and helping them—with young kids, with the sport and he does whatever he can to help others.”

Waynesburg will be looking for back-to-back PAC championships this Saturday, Feb. 10, at the Rudy Marisa Fieldhouse. The tournament starts at 11 a.m.