Northampton’s Julian Chlebove came home from the Escape the Rock tournament with a gold medal, while the K-Kids medaled four wrestlers in the tournament for a fifth place finish last weekend.

Chlebove handled Bethlehem Catholic’s Kenny Herrmann 7-2 in the 132-pound championship to lead the way for Northampton, who finished fifth in the tournament overall with 117.5 points.

After sitting out last year, Chlebove is rounding himself into form as the season is heading to it’s peak run. After winning state championships his freshman and sophomore years, Lisa feels it’s possible Chlebove gets his third this March.

“Julian is improving,” said Kids’ head coach Seth Lisa. “He has done a better job being aggressive and he’s able to smoothly hit moves and defend. I believe he’s in a good position to fight for another state title. Julian signed with Arizona State earlier this week and that has to be a tremendous stress taken off his shoulders. It will be an exciting end of the year for him.”

Other Kids’ to place over the weekend included Jagger Condomitti (145, fifth), Michael Kistler (152, sixth) and Alex Hanley (113, eighth). Taking a top five finish in one of the best midseason tournaments in the country was something Lisa and the staff can be encouraged about heading into this weekend’s EPC championship day at Easton Area Middle School.

“We were in first place after day one, and put ourselves in position to win the event,” Lisa said. “Unfortunately, we had a few difficult rounds Sunday and the team slid to fifth place. We need to do a better job finishing bouts, and winning the close matches.”

The Kids (11-2) got a warm-up match with East Stroudsburg North (2-14) on Wednesday night before presumably taking on Freedom (14-3) in Saturday’s EPC fifth/sixth place bout.

Lisa is hoping his team can close out the regular season on a high note before they head into district duals next weekend.

“This is a good opportunity to wrestle a tough team in the opposite side of our conference,” said Lisa. “We are excited for our final scheduled event and look forward to it.”