Northampton came ready to compete at last weekend's District 11 3A wrestling championships, as the Kids showed they still have a penchant for being a top-team to deal with when it comes to the individual postseason.

Dan Moran was the lone champion for the Kids, as Northampton advanced six wrestlers to this weekend's Northeast Regional 3A tournament following a fifth-place team finish at districts.

Moran, however, was the highlight of the weekend, defeating Liberty's KJ Fenstermacher 5-3 in the 113-pound championship.

"KJ's a really tough opponent and I knew he was going to give me everything he had going into the match," said Moran. "I'm just happy I was able to win this, but next week is a whole new tournament and I have to get ready for that."

Moran was able to score takedowns in the second and third periods to hold off his counterpart, as both have been friends since growing up. That closeness may have led to a feisty ending, as both wrestlers exchanged words following the match.

"We've been friends for a long time," Moran said. "We talked it out and apologized to each other and it's all good now."

The Kids had three wrestlers in last Saturday's finals, as Michael Scheetz (120) and Cade Moisey (152) also made it to the finals stage, but both were overpowered in their final bout.

Scheetz lost a 13-0 major decision to Nazareth's Sammy Sasso, who won the Outstanding Wrestler Award of the tournament, while Moisey fell into an 8-3 defeat to Bethlehem Catholic's Mike Labriola, forcing both to settle for silver medals.

Despite those defeats in the finals, head coach Seth Lisa was happy with how his team competed during the two-day event.

"As a team we thought, finishing in the top-five would be good, but a top-three would have been better," Lisa said. "I felt like all the kids stepped up and did their jobs. Andrew Szerencistis had an unfortunate injury at 145 with a dislocated elbow, where I thought we could have gotten points at. He was wrestling well and we thought he could have placed, so that's unfortunate, but I'm really happy with how the kids performed."

Joining the fleet to regionals also includes Todd Hetrick (132), Josh Coleman (160) and Jason Kocher (220).

Hetrick and Kocher reached the semifinals, but lost and battled back to win their consolation finals, as Hetrick topped Emmaus' Lucas Schaf 5-1 and Kocher doubled up with that same score against Freedom's Josh Newhart.

Coleman also reached the third-place consolation, but fell to Southern Lehigh's Richard Frable 6-3.

"I think last year we felt we started the postseason well and we did the same thing again," Lisa said. "Guys like Kocher and Coleman really stepped up and it's going to help them next weekend. I think all the guys moving on proved something to themselves and they know it's another week of work to try and get to states."