The Xavier wrestling team last won a State Open title in 2012. Danbury won six of the next eight state championships.
This season, Xavier beat Danbury in a hastily arranged dual meet when other tournament plans fell through for both teams due to COVID-19. It was a harbinger of things to come.
Xavier won its second State Open title Sunday at Floyd Little Athletic Center, scoring 204 points. Danbury was the runner-up with 145, Simsbury was third with 135 points and East Hartford, which tied Danbury for the Class LL title last week, was fourth (134).
“Every 10 years,” Xavier coach Mike Cunningham joked. “We had a great round coming back this morning, going for third, we had a bunch of kids get in. We had five kids going for third and fourth, so we got a lot of points.
“They ended up taking second. Never count Danbury out, that’s for sure.”
Xavier had two individual champions: freshman Jackson Heslin at 120 pounds and senior Thomas Lunt at 220.
Lunt won one match in the state tournament as a sophomore. There was no wrestling last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. So he was happy to finish his senior year with a title, beating Stratford’s James Duhancik, 9-6.
“Coaching helped a lot, and I got stronger,” Lunt said. “I had the technique and the coaching those two years, but I didn’t have the muscle to back it up. This year I put on some muscle and figured it out.”
Heslin won his first title with a 4-1 decision over Canton’s Ethan Titus.
“I wrestled all right,” said Heslin, who won gold and silver medals at the U15 Pan Am Games in Mexico last October. “I’ve got New England [championships] next weekend. That’s what I’m focusing on. I have to move my feet, get more shots, make my pace higher, try to block out those nerves.”
His sister Emma won the girls title at 99 pounds, making them the first brother and sister duo to win State Open championships in Connecticut. The girls State Open was started in 2020. Emma, a senior, wrestles for RHAM.
“I’ve been around it. [Jackson]’s been doing it since I remember,” said Emma, who started wrestling again this year after stopping after eighth grade. “I thought, ‘Why not try it?’ I’ve learned a lot from him, and he helps me a lot. I knew he was going to win, so I wanted to win, too.
“I just love to see the girls sport growing.”
Bristol Eastern senior Ella Nichols pinned Alexandria Gorman of New Haven in 1:12 to win her second State Open title at 152. Nichols is ranked fourth in the nation in her age group in girls wrestling.
“I’ve wrestled all boys; this is my first time wrestling girls,” Nichols said. “It’s been a great experience my senior year. I’m very lucky to have this tournament. I like wrestling the boys for the mental toughness, but when it comes to girls, I like to see what I’m able to do against my own gender.
“You have to kind of adjust your style. Girls, I can use my strength. Boys, I use more technique than I probably would with girls.”
Simsbury goes 3 for 3
Simsbury coach T.J. Silva didn’t leave the championship mat for three straight matches Sunday. He had senior John Mairano up first at 145. Mairano, who finished fourth at the Open in 138 in 2020, won his first Open title with a 5-3 decision over Jack Richardson of Killingly. Then Zach Johns was up at 152. Johns, who finished fourth in 2020 as a member of the Suffield/Windsor Locks team at 126, pinned Waterford’s Mason Concascia in 4:26 for his first title.
Then it was Mairano’s brother Chad’s turn at 160. Chad, a sophomore, had finished fourth last Saturday in the Class L championship. He rallied late in the third period to win Sunday, 5-3, over Joshua Nieroda of Suffield/Windsor Locks.
“What we told him all week long, no one remembers what happened at the L’s when you win the Open,” Silva said. “And he went and won the Open. He was losing in the finals there, didn’t stop wrestling and found himself on top of the podium as a sophomore. I knew if he was there at the end, he’d pull it through.”
And Simsbury went 3 for 3, which helped the Trojans finish third with 135 points in the team standings.
“It was crazy,” Chad Mairano said. “Crazy match. There were points in the match where I didn’t think I could win, but I just kept it in my mind, went out there, did what my coach told me.
“He’s a really strong wrestler. He was kind of dictating the match, but I saw holes in his game. I strategized in match and did what I had to do. I wasn’t really looking [at the clock]. I was just wrestling.”
Lori Riley can be reached at lriley@courant.com.
