By STEVE SINISKI
Winning a second championship took slightly less time for Laurino -- eight days to be exact. Laurino added the title of Nassau County Champion to his resume after pinning Plainedge's Joe Minnici in the finals last Sunday night at 160 pounds. The win catapulted Laurino into the New York State Tournament, to be held this Friday and Saturday at Nassau Coliseum.
"He went undefeated in the dual meets, and the week of the qualifier, he started doing the little things right," Cougars coach Brian DeGaetano said. "He took some momentum with him into the counties."
Laurino's crowning moment was the result of a third period pin, directly off the referee's whistle on a cross-face cradle from the top position at the 4:17 mark. Trailing 6-5 at the start of the period, Laurino waved off the coaching staff, which initially wanted an optional start. "I guess he knew something we didn't," DeGaetano said. "I'm glad he didn't listen. If the [wrestlers] feel momentum going a certain way, they can do that."
Fighting back from deficits of 2-1, 4-2 and 6-5, Laurino fought off an attempted pinfall from Minnici and even needed one minute of injury time during the bout after having the wind knocked out of him. But nothing would stand in his way of every wrestler's No. 1 preseason goal. "He won the two biggest tournaments and on the biggest stage performed the best," DeGaetano said of Laurino, who's currently 36-5 overall. "That was the best he's ever wrestled. He did not make one mistake the entire match."
As elated as the coaching staff was for Laurino, it had suffered through an equally crushing defeat just a few minutes prior. Mike Maher, the top-seeded wrestler in the tournament at 140 pounds, dropped a 9-1 championship round decision to Long Beach's Eduardo Delgado. "Everything we tried to do, he did a little bit better," DeGaetano said of Delgado. "We went from crying because one wrestler lost to crying because another one won. We went from the lowest point to the highest point."
Maher was one of a school-record seven Kennedy wrestlers to finish the season with at least 30 victories, ending his year with a 36-2 mark. A two-time All-County performer, Maher finished his Cougars career with 118 wins. "He's one of the best wrestlers I've ever coached," DeGaetano said.
The All-County circle was full of Kennedy grapplers, including Dominic Russo, Mike Breman and Mike Snow. Russo endured several nail-biting finishes to take home third place at 152 pounds, scoring a first-round win over the bracket's No. 2 seed with a buzzer-beating takedown to break a 3-3 tie. He dropped a decision in the quarterfinals in the final 15 seconds, before entering the All-County round with a takedown in the final two seconds to score a 7-5 victory over Joe Venezia from Herricks.
"He won four straight matches to take third," DeGaetano said, noting the importance of Russo's mental rebound after the crushing defeat cost him a shot at the individual title.
Breman won three consecutive decisions to capture sixth place at 112 pounds, while Snow earned sixth in the 135-pound weight class. Zach Cogen (112) and Glen Edelstein (189) each finished one victory shy of advancing to the All-County round. The strong performances pushed Kennedy to a No. 6 finish as a team and helped the program return to the Top 10 in the county for the first time since 2001. "The performances by everyone were outstanding," DeGaetano said. "A lot of the [opposing] coaches took notice of how we wrestled."
