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Sports

North Takes Down Lindenhurst, 45-18

Pins by Sean O'Hagan, Rich Avella and Gio Santiago power Arrows to victory.

Sachem North wrestling came up strong Monday, winning 10 of 15 matches en route to a 45-18 victory over Lindenhurst. 

The matches were drawing to a close with Lindenhurst’s Even Wildeberger and Sachem's Anthony Confessore, wrestling at 285, when the fire alarm sounded, forcing the gym to be evacuated and interrupting both varsity and junior varsity matches while everyone waited outside for fire department responders to arrive.

 The Stars: With nine wrestlers winning matches (Alec Ross won his by forfeit as Lindenhurst had no one to wrestle in the 112 weight class), there was a lot of praise to go around for North wrestling.

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Particularly good were the lightest class wrestlers, Matt Stallone at 96 pounds and Sean O’Hagan at 103, specifically.  Stallone had a dominating match of opponent Devin Wrieth, winning 10-0, while O’Hagan pinned opponent Milton Cerna in the first round to win his match.

Next highest at 119 and 125 were Frank Napoli and Dave Johnson, respectively.  Napoli pinned Manny Romano, and Johnson came through with a 9-1 win.

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Also notable was Rich Avella’s win over Andrew Aiello in the 145-weight class.  Avella was losing when he came through with a big time win in the second round of the match via pin.

 Gio Santiago also got the pin over his opponent, Kevin Szczech in the 189-weight class, this one coming in the third round.

Nick Iannello had a big match against Joe Napoleon at 140 pounds.  He lost to Napoleon twice last year but wrestled a strong match to a 4-2 win.

The Turning Point: Match wise, Lindenhurst was closing the points gap on Sachem when it got consecutive wins in the 145 and 152 pound bouts and closed North’s lead to eight points after Avella was forced to forfeit due to an injury when he took a hard fall onto the gym floor.  Anthony Marino got momentum swinging back Sachem's way when he won a close match over Lindenhursts’ Matt Gianelli, 3-2.

Quotable: “I think we’re still on the upswing,” Sachem head coach Ray Pickersgill said.  “I think we’re still moving in the right direction. We’re a young team and we’re just trying to sort it out and see where we’re going and I feel like our best wrestling is still ahead of us. When we lost to Floyd and Ward Melville I said that I think we’re going to be a better team at the end of the year and I still honestly believe that.”

The Bottom Line: Sachem's win moves them to the top of League II at 2-0.  The still have a long way to go, including another league meet against Walt Whitman this upcoming Friday, but individually their wrestlers showed a lot of promise as the came up with big wins over some tough Lindenhurst wrestlers.

Key Stat: Sachem came up with three wins via pin and had three wins by eight or more points.

Who’s Next?: Sachem will head to Walt Whitman high school this Friday for a 6:30 p.m. meet.

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