Breaking in many new faces in its lineup, the Baldwinsville wrestling team did not make things easy for itself with the competition it had to face in a five-day stretch spanning November and December.
First, the Bees lost at Fulton Nov. 30. Then it trailed most of the pack at the Andersen Tournament in Cicero-North Syracuse on Dec. 2 leading up to last Monday’s home opener, where it lost, 52-27, to Holland Patent.
B’ville only fielded 12 wrestlers, which meant it gave up 18 points due to forfeits, and couldn’t make up that ground elsewhere, especially after opening pins by HP’s Nick Herringshaw (170 pounds) and Garrett Evans (182 pounds).
Luke Eberl got the Bees on the board at 195 pounds by edging Bryce Dare 6-3, followed by Gunnar Hunt’s 79-second pin over 220-pound opponent Joe Gotte.
In the best match of the night, Billy Loadwick and the Golden Knights’ Austin Bollock went to two overtimes before Bollock pulled it out, 7-6, and B’ville took another close defeat at 106 pounds when Max Naples felt to Casey Caruso 5-4.
Jacob Cavallo, at 120 pounds, pinned Joe Diana in 45 seconds as Zach Hahn (126 pounds) followed with a 30-second fall over Mike Cummings. But HP won four of the last five bouts, the lone exception at 138 pounds where Will Bishoff took 83 seconds to pin Shawn Yocum.
B’ville then traveled to Dexter on Saturday for the General Brown Duals, where it went 2-3, finally getting its first team match win of the season when it edged Ogdensburg 42-38 and also topping South Lewis 39-38.
However, the Bees also fell to Camden 62-22, took a 57-21 defeat to Carthage and lost 45-24 to host General Brown. Camden was the overall champion with a 5-0 mark as Eberl was named his team’s Most Outstanding Wrestler.
Even with all this, more great news arrived for the B’ville program when it was announced that long-time coach Terry Dillon was one of the five men chosen for the Section III Wrestling Hall of Fame’s Class of 2018.
Dillon joins coaches Robert Coppola (Central Square) and Thomas O’Rourke (South Lewis), wrestler Steve Caruso (New Hartford) and contributor Gene Tracy in that Hall of Fame class.
Back on the mat, B’ville would have its Salt City Athletic Conference Metro division opener Wednesday against West Genesee before competing in Saturday’s Phoenix Round Robin.
