Within a 72-hour span, the Liverpool wrestling team would undertake its busiest stretch of the season, from back-to-back matches against Auburn and New Hartford to an appearance in the Leo J. Sammon Tournament at Central Valley Academy.
It started simply enough, with the Warriors going to Auburn and only dropping two bouts during a 67-9 rout of the Maroons.
Liverpool started with 10 consecutive victories, but only five of them were on the mat. Jalen Barron, at 170 pounds, pinned Alden Rubeck, with Nick Thomas (195 pounds) pinning Parker Hogan and Christian Bradshaw earning a fall over 99-pound opponent Luca Pirozollo.
At 182 pounds, Jack Ragonese beat Mike Hamilton 6-3, with Zach Eason (220 pounds) holding off Julian Bernard 5-3. Forfeits went to Anthony Piscatelli (160 pounds), Brad Depan (285 pounds), Corey Okun (106 pounds), Steve Pascarella (113 pounds) and Evan Burns (120 pounds).
When action resumed at 126 pounds, Sean Nadeau lost a narrow 2-1 decision to Austin Duger, but Audey Ashkar (132 pounds) countered with a 15-2 rout over Justin Marullo. Dylan Wallace, at 138 pounds, shut out Hunger Duger 4-0 as Jerry Nash (145 pounds) pinned Duger for the Warriors’ final points.
Back home 24 hours later to face New Hartford, the Warriors wieled a full roster, which had much to do with the big winning margin as it defeated the Spartans 62-24.
More than half the points came from six forfeits as Okun, Bradshaw, Wallace, Eason, Depan and Will Ronan (152 pounds) didn’t need to wrestle. In back-to-back shutouts, Nadeau beat Emerson Pratt 8-0 and Nash, moving down to 132 pounds, topped Tom Mulvihill 13-0.
Ashkar moved up to 138 and stayed in top form, pinning Tyler Ruhmel, while Barron got his second fall in as many nights over Brennan McKenna and Ragonese earned his own pin over Steve Rabbia.
Then it was on to the Sammon Tournament, where the Warriors would finish with 126.5 points, putting them in third place among a 13-team field. Host Central Valley won with 184 points, while Norwich was second with 163 points.
Again moving up, Ashkar went to 145 and won there, beating Central Valley’s David Bardo 8-1 in the finals. Barron was victorious at 170, pinning Norwich’s Brennan Slater in 1:34 in their title bout, while Ragonese reached the final at 182 and lost, 8-2, to Cortland’s Dakotah Miller.
Elsewhere, Bradshaw took third place at 99 when he pinned Oneida’s Devin Coleman in the second period. Nadeau, Wallace and Zach Curcie (160 pounds) each had fourth-place efforts. Pascarella pinned Oneida’s Dustin Coleman for fifth place at 106, with Nash beating Montana Wellenstein (Mount Markham) for fifth place at 132 and Ronan taking fifth place at 152 when he beat Dustin Marvin (Norwich) 5-2.
Liverpool hosts its annual showdown with Cicero-North Syracuse this Thursday night, this after a week for the Northstars where it found its own measure of success, starting with last Wednesday’s visit to Fayetteville-Manlius that resulted in a 64-15 victory over the Hornets.
Anthony Desimone opened at 145 by pinning James Ferro in 55 seconds, but it didn’t get going until 170, when Landry Rogers, with a first-period fall over Andrew Guillaume, began a string of five consecutive Northstars falls.
William Musick (182) waited until the middle of the third period to pin Sam French, with Jeremiah Butler (195) taking 2:27 to finish off Charlie Josephson. Chris St. Denny, at 220, pinned Preston Koester in 2:40 and Christian Anoceto (285) had a second-period fall over Andrew Testani.
Not content with that, C-NS won five more bouts in a row later in the meet, though three of them were forfeits to Nate Osborne (106), Jacob Montminy (113) and Jacob Hall (132). Travis Harrington wrestled at 120 and pinned Zac Colon, with Joe Mayers (126) handling Jon Scalzetti 18-6.
C-NS went from there to Saturday’s Port Byron Mid-Winter Tournament, where it rose all the way to second place with 163.5 points, edging out Skaneateles (161.0 points) for that runner-up spot, but behind Marcellus, who won with 205 points.
Harrington notched the Northstars’ lone title, at 113, routing Alex Czerniak (Marcellus) 17-4 in the final. Four other Northstars – Osborne, Musick, St. Denny and Josh Bigford (152) – also got to the championship round, but took defeats, Bigford getting close in a 9-7 loss to Port Byron’s Chris Hickey. Devan Flood finished fifth at 99 pounds.
