Posted on: Tuesday, January 7, 2003

Wrestling champ Spiker to Harvard

Advertiser Staff

Jonathan Spiker of Saint Louis School, an A-plus student on track to be the second four-time wrestling champion in Hawai'i high school history, said last night he has picked Harvard over Stanford for college.

Spiker received early acceptance from Harvard last week and telephoned Stanford to turn down the Cardinal's scholarship offer.

Harvard, a member of the Ivy League, does not give athletic scholarships; he has applied for financial aid.

"Harvard was my first choice," said Spiker, whose grade-point average is 4.25 because of taking advance placement (college level) classes, such as Japanese III. This year he is taking nothing but college level courses and his fall semester GPA was 5.0.

"Harvard was his dream college as long as I can remember," his father, John, said last night. "I thought, 'that's a big dream,' but I guess it's good to dream big."

Spiker has won 127 matches and never lost on a Hawai'i high school mat. If he four-peats at the state championships March 14-15 at Blaisdell Arena, he will become the only Hawai'i wrestler other than Iolani's Patrick Higa (1983-86) to win four state championships.

He wrestled at 145 pounds until this season, when he moved up to 152 for most matches. He was ranked 12th at 145 pounds by USA Wrestling after last season.

Spiker placed second at 145 pounds in the 103-team Reno Tournament of Champions Dec. 20-21, earning high-school All-American status.