CENTRAL NEW YORK – High-profile league meets were in place for the Liverpool and Cicero-North Syracuse wrestling teams as they both neared the holidays.
In the Warriors’ case, it meant a clash Wednesday with Baldwinsville, a team it had already seen in person during the Dec. 11 Phoenix Round Robin, where the Bees were second only to Rush-Henrietta and Liverpool claimed sixth place with 131 points.
Once head-to-head, B’ville got the jump, but Liverpool’s late surge ultimately produced a 39-34 victory.
Opening at 118 pounds, Samir Amiri pinned Collin Zeman, only to have B’ville take four of the next five bouts, the lone exception a contest at 138 pounds where Mohammed Yousof pinned Olusegen Gbengbe.
Then it turned around, Liverpool going 4-1 in the remaining contested bouts and clinching the victory because the last two bouts were forfeit, one to each side.
Jonah Geller, at 160 pounds, shut out Max Naples 5-0, with Owen Atchie (172 pounds) getting a pin over Judson Ferris. Connor Kral, working at 189 pounds, pinned Parrish Morrison, and Cade Leombrone pinned Korbin Haney for what proved to be the clinching points.
Back at Phoenix, Liverpool had seen none of its wrestlers get to the championship round, with only Lucas Smith, at 126 pounds, finishing third as he won his consolation bracket final by pinning Palmyra-Macedon’s Matt Brongo in 1:57.
Four others had finished fourth, including Leombrone, Amiri at 110 pounds, Geller at 145 pounds and Paul Marquis at 152 pounds Marquis had fallen 7-3 to B’ville’s Aaron Fredenburg and Leombrone got pinned by Haney, a loss he would avenge a few days later.
Rocco DeGiormo was fifth at 132, a finish that Joe Piscitelli matched at 189 pounds. Yousuf and Kral both gained sixth place.
C-NS, meanwhile, had gone to Chenango Valley on Dec. 10 and 11 for the Matt Fedish Memorial Duals, where it knocked off each of the eight opponents it faced.
The first half involved the Northstars turning away Groton 45-26, the issue in doubt until late pins by Anthony Ciciarelli at 118 and Kenedy Thomas in 126, both of them taking less than 90 seconds.
A 63-12 romp over Maine-Endwell, and C-NS nearly matched that score routing Oneonta 62-12. Topping Binghamton 54-21, the Northstars then handled Homer 60-15 and beat host Chenango Valley 48-25.
In the closing effort, a 61-12 victory over Susquehanna Valley, Dominick Racht (138) and Dylan Firenze (172) both earned pins, with Racht taking just 24 seconds to pin Zack Fedorwich.
Meanwhile, the C-NS junior varsity team had swept Groton, Maine-Endwell, Binghamton, Homer, Chenango Valley and Susquehanna Valley to win Phoenix’s JV tournament.
