Calhoun trio earns All-County

Three Calhoun seniors capped their careers by earning All-County honors at last weekend’s Nassau County Division I Wrestling Championships at Hofstra University, led by Jesse Bader, a finalist at 152 pounds. Nick Pititto took fourth at 189 and Sam Gorinsky was fifth at 171. Bader advanced to the championship round against Long Beach’s Adam DeJesus on the strength of three straight victories following a first-round bye.

DeJesus won his 141st career match with a 4-1 decision in the defensive battle, preventing Bader from mounting much of an attack over the course of the six minutes. “He knew how to counter the shoots,” Colts coach Rich Bury said. “He’s a quality opponent. [DeJesus] was very good defensively.”

Neither wrestler managed a point in the third period, and DeJesus scored the only points in the second. Bader’s point came on a first period escape. Bader’s three victories helped run his record to 41-3 this season and included a 5-2 win over Plainedge’s Dan Spurgeon, and an 11-3 decision over Farmingdale’s Josh Jeannoute. He started the tournament with a second round win by technical fall at the 2:44 mark over North Shore’s Jake Alverson. 

As much as Bader’s final match was a defensive battle, so too was Pititto’s, who fell short in a 2-0 decision for third place against North Shore’s Nick Capparelli. In fact, it was mostly about defense all weekend for Pititto, who won his three wrestleback matches over Division’s Robert McNamara and Uniondale’s Davion Porter by identical 3-2 scores and knocked off East Meadow’s Chris Parisi with a 3-1 decision. Pititto was knocked to the wrestleback round after getting pinned by Wantagh’s Joe Kavanagh with just eight seconds left in their match. He earned a 13-1 majority decision over Division’s Tim Schweitzer to start the weekend.

An 8-3 decision over Freeport’s Kevin Sanchez capped Gorinsky’s All-County weekend that also included a pair of tough losses to Farmingdale’s Ben Rosen (5-4) in the wrestleback round and a 5-3 overtime defeat to Division’s Juan Carlos Diaz. In the sudden death loss, Gorinsky was taken down by Diaz for the final points of the match.

Gorinsky started the tournament with pins over his first two opponents, ending his match with Uniondale’s Teniola Daramola 42 seconds into the third period and stopping his first bout against Herricks’ Kevin Ryersen at the 4:37 mark.