In what way did the ante-nicene church read Sapiental passages like Proverbs 8:22 christologically? Commentators like Ellicott indicate that the ante-nicene Christian writers (from A.D. 100 to the Council of Nicaea) read Proverbs 8:22 christologically, that is, in reference to Christ. 

In what way did these writers understand this verse christologically?
Early (pre-Nicaea) church fathers interpreted this verse christologically in the sense that Christ is eternally begotten of the Father.

Ellicott writes that this was the view held by early fathers like Justin Martyr and Tertullian:


  When in Christian times it was observed how well the description of Wisdom in Job and Proverbs harmonised with that of God the Son in the New Testament, such passages as this were universally applied to Him, and the present one was rightly interpreted as describing His eternal generation from the Father. Such was the view, for instance, of Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian. 


Justin Martyr uses Proverbs 8:22 in his argument about the nature of Christ, and concludes:


  Scripture has declared that this Offspring was begotten by the Father before all things created; and that which is begotten is numerically distinct from that which begets, any one will admit. (Dialogue with Trypho, 129)


In reference to Proverbs 8:22, Tertullian writes:


  Thus does He make Him equal to Him: for by proceeding from Himself He became His first-begotten Son, because begotten before all things. (Against Praxeas, 7)


Others, like Athenagoras (A Plea for the Christians, 10) hold the same view, and some argue that Origen represented "patristic exegesis" in interpreting the passage as referring to Christ's "continual coming into existence" (Waltke, Book of Proverbs, Chapters 1–15, p127).

It's important to note that later writers, like Augustine and Athanasius, developed different views of how this passage applies to Christ.  They did this as a response to the Arian controversy.  The earliest fathers, however, when interpreting the passage christologically, understood it to refer to the eternally begotten nature of Christ.