Locals star in wrestling qualifiers

Two dozen wrestlers from Kennedy, Calhoun and Mepham finished fourth or better at qualifying tournaments last Saturday and earned berths in this weekend’s Nassau County Division I Wrestling Championships at Hofstra University.

The three schools also combined for six individual champions with Kennedy sophomore Robert Person (96 pounds) and seniors Bobby Krug (135) and Evan Goldschlag (160) taking first place in their weight classes at the qualifier hosted by Farmingdale. Person (36-1 overall) and Krug (38-2) started and finished the tournament as the No. 1 wrestlers in their class, while Goldschlag improved his record to 37-5 and captured his first-ever tournament title.

Calhoun finished fourth at the Freeport qualifier and was led by seniors Jesse Bader (152) and Sam Gorinsky (171), who won championships after entering the tournament as No. 1 seeds. “This is what they’ve worked all year for, the county tournament,” Calhoun coach Rich Bury said.

Mepham’s top finisher was senior Mike Paccione, a 140-pounder who improved to 32-4 with an 8-2 decision in the final over Long Beach’s Nick Khoury at the Long Beach qualifier. “He beat a county finalist from last year,” Pirates coach Rich Anderson said.

The Cougars ended the regular season with a school-record 22 wins in 27 dual meets and also won the Conference II-B title and picked up right where they left off at Farmingdale. Along with Person, Krug and Goldschlag, nine other Kennedy wrestlers are headed to Hofstra. “We’ve met a lot of challenges this year,” Cougars coach Brian DeGaetano said. “We beat a lot of quality teams and they’ve rallied around each other.”

Four Kennedy wrestlers were runners-up, including sophomore Rich Luxmore at 119, senior Mike Pizzirusso at 145, senior John Silverman at 171 and junior Matt Accetta at 215. Juniors Mark Levine (103), John Luxmore (152) and Jeff Scialo (285) and sophomore Tyler Smith (112) finished third in their weight class, and junior Tyler Goldberg finished fourth at 140.