Fans won’t be allowed to watch the action at the Bristol Central or Casey Dane Yates tournaments on Saturday but both can be followed on YouTube and FloArena.
With the spread of the omnicon variant of COVID-19, state wrestling teams are scrambling to stay healthy and find some competition. Eight matches were postponed on Wednesday night and three were postponed on Thursday.
With the cancellation of Saturday’s Spartan Wrestling Tournament in Sanford, Maine, No. 1 Danbury will visit No. 2 Xavier in Middletown instead beginning at 12:30 p.m.
Danbury (3-0) and Xavier (5-1) were scheduled to wrestle at the SWAT tournament but it was cancelled due to the rising number of COVID-19 infections in the Sanford school district. The last time the top two teams in the Connecticut Wrestling Online top 10 poll met was on Feb. 1, 2020 when top-ranked Danbury beat then-No. 2 Simsbury, 51-17.
Danbury remained undefeated on Thursday with nine pins in a 75-6 win over New Canaan. Xavier dominated SCC rival Branford on Wednesday, 62-6, with four pins and a technical fall.
Earlier this week, the 12th annual Warde Invitational at No. 3 Fairfield Warde was cancelled. District officials in Fairfield were not comfortable with the large size (15 teams) of the tournament. Warde (5-0), which last wrestled Dec. 29 at the George Bossi Lowell Holiday Tournament, will be idle this weekend.
Bunnell, Norwalk, Staples and Westhill were all set to compete at the Warde Invitational but they will all travel to Simsbury for a five-team dual meet event. No. 4 Simsbury was also scheduled to wrestle at the Warde Invitational.
A seven-team meet at Jonathan Law scheduled for Saturday was also cancelled. Law was supposed to host Canton, Cheshire, Derby/Oxford/Holy Cross, Shelton and St. Joseph. Instead, Shelton will be hosting Brookfield and Wilton.
Two other tournaments are still set to go on Saturday. The 39th annual Bristol Central Invitational is ready to go but no spectators will be allowed. Fans can follow the tournament on FloArena and on this YouTube channel.
The ninth annual Casey Dane Yates Invitational is set to be held at Lyman Memorial in Lebanon with 12 teams expected to participate. No fans will be allowed in this tournament as well. Results will be on FloArena and there will be three YouTube channels to allow fans to see the action. Links will be available in the morning at the Lyman Athletics twitter page.
Wednesday, Jan. 5 results and boxscores
Thursday, Jan. 6 results and boxscores
It was a busy night of action on Wednesday night around the state. No. 6 Foran (3-0) won the final four matches with three pins to force a tie with Guilford and prevailed, 40-39, on criteria (most wins) in SCC Division I match.
Foran’s Mason Hallstrom (120) earned a six-point win before teammates Anthony Madero (126), Craig Mager (132) and Anthony Giordano (138) got pins to tie the match at 39-39. It was the first loss of the year for Guilford (7-1).
Farmington (1-0) won their first match of the year with a 37-36 win over Conard on criteria (fewer forfeits). Conard had four forfeits while Farmington had just one. The River Hawks got pins from Richard Cody (145) and Jason Guglietta (120) that helped tie the match.
No. 5 Killingly had nine pins in a 77-6 win over Putnam to remain undefeated at 9-0. There were just three forfeits in the match … Pins from Vincenzo Previti (285), Seamus Oates (220), Tyler Mangene (138) and Jacob Perez (126) helped Newington slip past New Britain, 31-30.
Wednesday, Jan. 5 results and boxscores
Thursday, Jan. 6 results and boxscores
On Thursday night, Pomperaug improved to 8-1 with victories over Middletown, 39-27, and Haddam-Killingworth, 36-30. Michael Carpenter (152) had a pair of pins for the Panthers. … Ellis Tech had five pins to earn a non-conference win over Griswold/Wheeler, 40-33.
