Both inside and outside their respective leagues, the area’s three high school wrestling teams would all suffer defeats in Wednesday night’s slate.
Fayetteville-Manlius could not keep up with CNY Counties League leader Baldwinsville in a 56-18 defeat. CBA/Jamesville-DeWitt dropped a close 45-34 decision to Whitesboro, while East Syracuse-Minoa lost to Chittenango 62-12.
F-M did find some early headway against the Bees, especially Paddy Quinlan, who won a tense 138-pound match against two-time sectional champion Kevin Paul 6-4, right after Jordan Nelipowitz (132 pounds) claimed a 4-2 decision over Patrick O’Neill.
B’ville went from there to winning seven of the next eight matches, five of them pins, with only Luke Rufo (145 pounds) lasting the full six minutes in a 12-5 loss to Chad McArdell.
In a late highlight, Tim Byrnes, at 182 pounds, gave the Hornets its lone pin of the night, finishing off Alex Bowen in 2:40. Will Khalil claimed a forfeit at 106 pounds.
Whitesboro hurt CBA/J-D by winning every match from 106 to 132 pounds, including three pints and a forfeit, which added up to 27 points. For its part, CBA/J-D swept the four bouts from 138 to 160 pounds, but only Matt Lauro got a pin at 138, finishing off Zach Levesque in 2:32.
Hamza Khatib (152 pounds) dominated his match with Mike Kocinski, but settled for a 12-1 majority decision, while Tucker Benedict (160) turned back Dan Knapp 5-1. In a closer match at 145 pounds, Lucas Rowe won a 6-3 decision over Marc Eberley.
Three other times, CBA/J-D prevailed with pins. Mark Friske had the quickest one at 182 pounds, needing just 68 seconds for his fall over Walter Grzesik, while Matt Griffin (99 pounds) handled Brian Burdick in 1:25 and Ben Honis (220 pounds) needed 2:43 to pin Tyler Hudson.
In ESM’s loss to Chittenango, it suffered through five straight defeats at the start, four of them pins, with only Jeff Loder (132 pounds) going the full six minutes as he lost to Connor Fredericks 8-2.
Sam LeGro, at 152 pounds, finally got the Spartans on the board, pinning Cory Fredericks in 1:53, just before Medo Pugonja (160 pounds) lost to Erik Ellefson 9-5. Jacob Kingsley (113 pounds) claimed a forfeit before an exciting 120-pound finale where Tyler Gardner kept right with Kanisteo Tarbell before settling for an 18-16 defeat.
F-M would run into Baldwinsville again on Saturday, at the Phoenix Round Robin Tournament.
