Getting off to a good start at the PIAA Wrestling Championships is extremely beneficial.

On Thursday, Butler's Cole Baxter advanced to today's Class AAA rounds — barely.

Grove City's Wes Phipps, on the other hand, picked up a win in the Class AA preliminaries and advanced to the quarterfinal round.

Baxter, the WPIAL runner-up at 171 pounds and the WPIAL champion at 145 last year, dropped a 7-4 decision to Coughlin's Josh Popple (34-5) in the preliminary round.

Baxter fell into the first-round consolation but earned a 7-5 decision over Hatboro's Nick Lynch.

Baxter will compete in today's second-round consolations at 2:45 p.m. A loss would end the tournament for Baxter, while a win would put him in the third-round consolations Saturday

Phipps, the District 10 champion and Northwest Region runner-up at 160 pounds, pinned Allentown Notre Dame's John Blank at 3:38.

Phipps was scheduled Benton's Eric Hess, who picked up a technical fall win over Bentworth's Dylan Demain, in the Class AA quarterfinals at 8 a.m. today.

A loss will send him to the second-round consolations at 9:45 a.m. A win, however, would send Phipps to the 6:30 p.m. semifinals.