Only a handful of matches remained for the Baldwinsville wrestling team before it would venture to West Genesee for this Saturday’s Section III Class AA championship meet.

To start with, the Bees traveled to Canastota last Wednesday night, where it dropped the last seven bouts on the board in the course of a 60-21 defeat to the Raiders.

After Gunnar Hunt lost, 6-0, to Mike Leibl in the 220-pound opener, Billy Loadwick got B’ville on the board at 285 pounds when he pinned Nate Saunders 50 seconds into the second period.

Three Canastota pins followed, but then B’ville got forfeits to Zach Hahn (120 pounds) and Cole Accordino (126 pounds) before Jacob Cavallo, at 132 pounds, earned an 8-3 decision over Darren Domenicone.

For the rest of the night, though, the Raiders dominated, claiming four pins and two forfeits before Luke Eberl, in the final bout at 195 pounds, lost a 10-2 battle to Doug Simmons.

Then, in Friday night’s meet against Fayetteville-Manlius, the Bees had more wrestlers on hand, yet could not hold on to an early lead in a 33-28 defeat to the Hornets.

Down 9-0, B’ville began to stir with Loadwick’s overtime takedown that beat Zack Henderson 3-1 before forfeits to Aiden Cali (99 pounds) and Max Naples (106 pounds).

Zach Hahn also claimed a forfeit at 120, but Cavallo, wrestling at 126, beat Sam Abreham 13-3, and it gave the Bees a 28-12 lead. But F-M would win each of the next five bouts to go in front for good.

Many of  those were close contests as Nate Hahn, at 138 pounds, fell to Justin Bedell 7-2, with John Eustice (152 pounds) taking a 7-5 defeat to Ben Christopher and Dennis Kral (160 pounds) losing 6-4 to Alex Dauksza.  Cameron Salce, at 182 pounds, did beat Ronan Pierie in a 3-1 decision.