FULTON – Perhaps the best part of the wrestling Section III Dual Meet was that Liverpool and Cicero-North Syracuse would go head-to-head in the opening round of the Division I bracket.
Their showdown Tuesday night at Fulton would see the Warriors earn four different pins to overcome the Northstars and earn a 35-26 victory.
C-NS stood as the no. 4 seed, but it was Liverpool, the no. 5 seed, taking seven of the 13 bouts, including falls at both ends as Samir Amiri, at 102 pounds, pinned Jacob LaPoint and Cade Leombrone, at 285 pounds, did the same to Joe Kozubowski.
In between, there was Jonah Geller (145 pounds) pinning Gavin Ciszewski right before Josiah Russel, at 152 pounds, pinned Zion Mukasa.
Liverpool’s other titles went to Rocco DeGilormo (118 pounds) and Connor Kral (189 pounds) in major decisions over, respectively, Anthony Ciciarelli and Austin Hartman, with Tyler Vivacqua, at 132 pounds, beating Drew Baker.
On the Northstars’ side, three bouts were won by falls. Kennedy Thomas pinned 126-pound opponent Lucas Smith as Dylan Firenze (172 pounds) did the same to Jayce Bliss and Kamdin Bembry (215 pounds) pinned Brennan Connors.
The Warriors saved points by keeping other bouts close, such as John Sherbourne’s 4-2 win over Owen Atchie at 160 pounds and Kevin Mossow edging Pierce Goodave 3-1 at 110 pounds. Dominick Racht won his 138-pound bout over Mohammed Yousuf.
Moving into the semifinals to face top seed Indian River, Liverpool could not quite replicate that performance, taking a 39-30 defeat to that other group of Warriors.
They opened at 285, where Leombrone droppd a 4-2 decision to Davin Dewaine. Pins by Amiri over Gabriel Whiting in 45 seconds and DeGilormo over Jack Countryman in the last seconds put Liverpool in front 12-9.
Howver, IR took the next five bouts, accumulating 21 points that included Yousuf’s narrow 2-0 loss to Brady Lynch and Geller losing 7-3 to Manuel Gonzales. The only other points came from forfeits to Atchie, Kral and Bliss.
C-NS also had a match with Carthage where it lost, 37-36, to the Comets, who won the first five bouts on the card to gain a 27-0 lead.
Fighting back, the Northstars got consecutive pins from Ciszewski, Mukasa, Sherbourne and Firenze, plus pins late in the match from Bembry and Mossow, but Kozubowski lost a 2-0 decision to Kamdyn Dorchester that proved decisive.
IR went on to beat Camden in Thursday’s championship match at C-NS as Liverpool, that same night, met Morrisville-Eaton and prevailed 52-22 over that other set of Warriors.
Yousuf, Atchie and Kral each finished with pins as Vivacqua got a technical fall over Luke Brayman and Geller did the same against Tyler Scholtzhauer.
Then Liverpool knocked off Victor (Section V) 33-30 on Saturday with consecutive pins from Yousuf, Smith and Nick Ault (132) and Kral ended up with the clinching points when he beat Matt Braun 5-3. Atchie, Leombrone and Jayce Bliss (172 pounds) all saved points, even though they lost close decisions.
