Farmington’s Jason Guglietta picks up South Windsor freshman Jacob Gordon off the mat in Saturday’s final at 120 pounds at the CCC Tournament in Simsbury.
Saturday night may not have been a restful evening for Fairfield Ward head coach Jason Shaughnessy. His No. 3 Mustangs came with 3½ points of Danbury but the Hatters prevailed with their tenth straight FCIAC tournament championship, 225½ to 221, at New Canaan High School. It’s the closest finish in the tournament since Warde beat Danbury in 2010 by eight points.
When a team loses a hard-fought tournament, there usually are potential points littered across the lineup that could have been picked up.
Warde had four finalists and won two matches. Lucas Coleman (152) outlasted Ridgefield’s Lucas Ferreira, 8-6 while Will Ebert had his third pin of the tournament – all in the first period – to win at 170 pounds.
In the consolation finals, Warde went 2-2 but one loss was a 4-1 win by Danbury’s Devin Stewart over Warde’s Jack Dean at 126 pounds.
Danbury won three of five matches in the finals with Cristian Pote (106), Kai O’Dell (138) and Logan Kovacs (145) each winning individual championships. Pote and O’Dell won by pins for extra bonus points for the Hatters. In the consolation final, Danbury won four of five matches to pick up some key points. Pote had a big head-to-head win with Warde, beating Owen Sherman in the title bout.
For the second consecutive event, Staples finished third with Trumbull finishing fourth and Ridgefield just a half point behind the Eagles in fifth place.
Two Trumbull wrestlers won FCIAC championships – Aethan Munden (195) and Lukas Cylwik (220).
Read more about the FCIAC Tournament from Scott Ericson of GameTimeCT or David Fierro of The Ruden Report.
Saturday’s February 12 results
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No. 4 Simsbury had five finalists and four individual champions as the Trojans won the slimmed-down Central Connecticut Conference (CCC) tournament in Simsbury. Ten teams took a pass on the tournament including No. 5 East Hartford, Bristol Central, Bristol Eastern, Hall and Conard.
Simsbury, which won the CCC West, finished first with 257½ points followed by CCC South champion Berlin with five finalists, three individual champions and 210 points. CCC East champion RHAM was third with 178 points with Avon taking fourth with 153½.
Why did those 10 teams not participate? Good question. They weren’t there to comment.
“The (conference) tournament is an important because it is a dress rehearsal for (next week’s state championship), the (State) Open and the New England (tournament) coming up,” Simsbury coach T.J. Silva said. “It allows to see where we have to change things for next week.”
Simsbury will challenge No. 1 Xavier at next week’s Class L championship meet in Wilton. In 2019, the Trojans were a half-point behind Bristol Eastern at the Class L meet and 2½ points behind Xavier in 2020.
There were no state championship meets in 2021 since the season was cancelled due the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Last year, we lost the opportunity to have a class tournament, a State Open and New England (tournament),” Silva said. “So, the more matches these guys can get the better off they will be in the long run.”
Cael Finn (132), John Mairano (145), Zach Johns (152) and Begench Kulvyey (285) won individual CCC titles for Simsbury. Johns and Kulvyey won by pin while Mairano won by technical fall.
Avon’s Isaiah Adams, left, tilts Berlin’s Griffin Devivo in the final at 113 pounds in Saturday’s CCC Tournament in Simsbury.
A COVID-inspired cancellation wiped out a chance for Berlin to wrestle Trumbull and No. 3 Fairfield Warde earlier this season while a snowstorm eliminated another challenging weekend date.
Berlin High coach Peter Veleas said the Redcoats needed the competition. “We could’ve won a few more matches but that is why we need a day like this,” he said. “To go back to the drawing board and say this is what you need to work on, you need to be tougher in this situation or work here.
“We haven’t seen a team like Simsbury all year. We needed to see a team like that. You can’t hit the fastball until you’ve seen the fastball,” he said.
Marco Marino (170), Nick Ebrahimi (195) and Hamza Mourabit (220) each won for the Redcoats with Mourabit and Ebrahimi each winning by pin.
New Britain had two wrestlers in the finals with Eric Maldonado (126) winning a CCC title with a 6-1 win over Zain Gray of South Windsor.
“It’s just more mat time,” Hurricane head coach Nick Catalano said. “We have some inexperienced wrestlers and we need to get them on the mat. I love the competition (here). We’ll be here every year. It’s about the experience (especially) this year.”
RHAM had three individual champions led by Ben Fournier (106), Zach Kanaitis (138) and Jeremy Devine (165). All three had first period pins to win individual titles.
Saturday’s February 12 results
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With four individual champions and five finalists, Killingly won their fourth straight ECC championship Saturday in their home gym with a 184½ to 153 win over NFA. New London finished third, a half point ahead of East Lyme/Norwich Tech for their first top 3 finish in the tournament this century.
Brady Zadora (106), Kaden Ware (126), Jack Richardson (145) and Soren Reif (182) each brought home ECC titles for KHS. Richardson, who was 3-0 with three pins, was named the tournament’s most outstanding wrestler.
Killingly is the first team to win four straight ECC titles since Ledyard in 2005-08. East Lyme/Norwich Tech had four finalists. Ledyard senior Connor Doran (132) and senior Mason Concasia of Waterford (152) each won their second ECC titles.
NFA captured the ECC Division I title while Windham claimed the ECC Division III championship. In Division III, Killingly finished first.
Read more about the ECC Tournament from Ned Griffin at The Day of New London and more about Ledyard’s Linda Holeman from Day columnist Mike DiMauro.
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With five individual champions and six finalists, Portland won the NCCC Tournament for the first time and captured their first NCCC championship. Portland (14-11, 6-1 NCCC) and Stafford (9-4, 6-1 NCCC) finished the regular season tied at the top of the league.
Teams earn one point for each NCCC dual meet victory and a half point for each team they beat at the league championship meet. Portland finished with 9½ points while Stafford finished with nine. Portland’s last league title came in 2003 when they were members of the Charter Oak Conference.
Portland, which joined the NCCC in wrestling as an associate member in 2020, won the tournament at Rockville High in Vernon with 171 points with Stafford taking second with 151. Canton was third with 126 points.
Spencer Rosado (138), Ethan Dean (145), Tyler Quinn (152), Owen Brunk (220) and Ashton Oakliff (285) each captured NCCC titles for the Highlanders with Dean, Brunk, and Oakliff each winning with a pin.
Stafford had two individual champions with Derek Davis winning at 195 pounds and Tommy Bean prevailing at 182. Kaleb Arcouette was second at 220 with four Bulldogs wrestlers wrestling back to finish third.
Canton’s Ethan Titus (132) and Reese Titus (120) each won NCCC titles for the Warriors, who had six wrestlers in the finals.
Saturday’s February 12 results
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There were a limited number of wrestlers on the mat at the Berkshire Valley tournament in Winsted with some of the smallest schools in the state with wrestling programs. Only six of the 14 weight classes had enough wrestlers for the traditional tournament format. The remaining eight weight classes were round robin.
Nonnewaug won the Berkshire Valley tournament for the first time with a 20-point win over Gilbert, 104-84. The Chiefs were the only team in the tournament close to a full-size team with 14 wrestlers on their roster. Terryville/Thomaston and St. Paul each have six wrestlers each on their respective rosters while Gilbert has five along with a wrestler from Torrington that works out with the team.
Derby/Oxford/Holy Cross, a co-op program with three schools, has nine wrestlers on the team.
“It was very different,” Nonnewaug coach Dave Green said. ”I am glad the kids got a chance to wrestle.”
Part of the 17 wrestlers in Nonnewaug’s daily practice are three wrestlers from Shepaug Valley. All three Shepaug wrestlers – Kip Faison (138), Lane Faison (145) and Brendan Kelly (152) — won individual titles on Saturday to lift the Spartans to a fourth-place finish.
The outstanding wrestler in the tournament was Woodland Regional’s Elias Sturdevant, who won his third Berkshire Valley title in four years with his win at 132 pounds, topping Gilbert’s Jon Eagan, 15-4. Sturdevant won the tournament as a freshman (113) and sophomore (120).
It was the seventh time that the tournament was held for Berkshire League and Naugatuck Valley League athletes. The Chiefs’ last Berkshire League tournament win came in 2014.
Read more from Jason Levy at the Republican American in Waterbury or Peter Wallace from GameTime CT.
Saturday’s February 12 results
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No. 9 New Milford (6-1) had four finalists and two individual champions as they won the Southwest Conference championship with a 9½ point win over Newtown, 181½ to 171. Evan Lindner (126) and Max Piel (145) won SWC titles for the Green Wave, who also had three wrestlers finish third. It was New Milford’s 13th league championship in the last 15 years.
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Greens Farms Academy (13-1) won seven individual titles and had 10 finalists to win the Western New England Interscholastic Wrestling Association (WNEISWA) championship with a dominating 323 to 235 win over Brunswick School in Greenwich. It’s the second straight WNEISWA title for the Dragons, who also won in 2020. Peter Kane’s title at 152 pounds came after four straight pins, which came in 19 seconds, 45 seconds, 51 seconds and 41 seconds, respectively.
Saturday’s February 12 results
