Throughout the winter, the CBA/Jamesville-DeWitt wrestling team has stood up quite well amid large fields at high-quality meets.
Going to last weekend’s Richard New Memorial Tournament at Canastota, CBA/J-D finished third in a 17-team field, earning 182 points. Only the host Canastota Raiders, with 238 points, and Phoenix, with 214 points, fared better.
Fayetteville-Manlius and East Syracuse-Minoa also wrestled at this meet, with the Hornets gaining 101 points for eighth place and the Spartans getting 55 points for 15th place.
CBA/J-D’s Ben Honis emerged as the 195-pound champion. In the semifinals, Honis rolled pat Canastota’s Wyatt Albanese 10-2, setting up a title match with Gouverneur’s Hunter Ayen, and 38 seconds into the second period Honis pinned Ayen to earn first place.
At 145 pounds, J.T. Romagnoli earned his ticket to the finals with an 8-1 decision over another Canastota wrestler, Anthony Micaroni. Then Romangoli ran into Phoenix’s Nate Dietz and lost the final in a tight 7-3 match.
Three other CBA/J-D wrestlers managed third-place efforts, winning their consolation bracket finals. Matt Lauro (132 pounds) did so by beating F-M’s Jacob Norton 9-1, while Mark Friske (170 pounds) pinned Canastota’s Xavier Johnson in 2:08 and Zach Shapiro, at 220 pounds, took 1:59 to pin yet another Raider wrestler, Wyatt Albanese.
Nigel Knox-Shellman edged Kyle Mapley (Cato-Meridian) 5-4 for fifth place at 132 pounds, while Kaalar Wynn, at 182 pounds, won his fifth-place match over his teammate, George Kassis, 7-4. Arsen Bagiryan (120 pounds) and Andrew Zimbal (285 pounds) had sixth-place finishes.
ESM’s best finish came at 145, where Kyle Parella, beaten in the semifinals by Dietz, rebounded and beat Micaroni 8-3 in the consolation-bracket final. Alex Moss was fourth at 195, dropping a 2-1 decision to Albanese in that same round, while Sam LeGro was sixth at 138 pounds.
Meanwhile, F-M’s Luke Rufo rose to third place at 126 pounds, edging West Genesee’s Odae Badwan 9-6 in the consolation-bracket final as Norton and Tristan Broddus (138) both had fourth-place efforts. The Hornets’ Tim Byrnes (160 pounds) and Jon Hajduk (170 pounds) both finished fifth, aided by injury defaults.
Before all this, CBA/J-D met Fulton last Thursday night, and had a big early lead against the perennial power, but could not hold on in a 44-32 loss to the Red Raiders.
In fact, CBA/J-D won six of the first eight matches. Lauro opened with a third-period fall over Tim Holden, with Knox-Shellman beating Mike Eddy 11-3. Romagnoli handled Mike DeMauro 8-2.
Wynn, with a tough 3-1 decision over Todd Oakes, began a string of three straight match wins. David Sayre, wrestling at 195, pinned Tim Conners in 3:09, and Honis dominated Derek Owen in an 11-0 shutout.
At that point, CBA/J-D led 32-12. But Fulton would sweep each of the remaining six matches, including two forfeits, two pins and a technical fall. Only Bagiryan lasted the full six minutes, falling to Jonathan Earl 7-2.
