By Jay Pinsonnault
jpinsonnault@seacoastonline.com
The York High School wrestling team may not have won the inaugural Hammerhead Duals on Saturday, but it did receive favorable responses from the seven other schools and would like to continue the event next year.
“The other coaches and kids thought it was great, and they hope we keep it on the schedule,” York coach Wally Caldwell said. “That’s the key, once you get it on there, you want to keep it on there. Hopefully, it just gets better.”
York split its four matches on the day, beating Wiscassett and Monmouth, while losing to Dirigo and Wells.
Massabesic defeated Dirigo in the finals.
“Massabesic has some good wrestlers and so does Dirigo,” Caldwell said. “So having those two schools in the finals was good.”
The tournament featured Class A Massabesic, three Class B schools in York, Wells and Oak Hills, and four Class C schools — Monmouth, Dirigo, Boothbay and Wiscasset.
York’s Connor Elsemore (170 pounds) and Mark Slusher (195) were both undefeated on the day, winning all four of their respetive matches.
York’s Jon Mackamin (106) and Alex Papp (145) and Josh Smith (152) all went 3-1. Smith’s only loss came against Dirigo.
“I thought it was going to be a competitive match, and it was,” Caldwell said.
The Wildcats get back on the mat on Saturday at Fryeburg Academy for a quad meet with the hosts, Kennebunk and Oak Hill.
“We had a good match against Kennebunk recently and we’d like to turn a few of those matches around,” Caldwell said. “We beat Fryeburg a couple of weeks ago and they always have a pretty good lineup.”
Following this Saturday, the Willdcats will have the league meet at Mountain Valley on Saturday, Jan. 31, the regional meet at Wells on Saturday, Feb. 7, and the state meet at Freyburg Academy on Saturday, Feb. 14.
“It’s getting to be that time in the season where we start thinking of where kids should wrestle,” Caldwell said. “We thought about moving Connor (Elsemore) down to 160, but we’re going to keep him at 170. If we moved him down, he would have to pay more attention to his weight. He’s so competitive at 170, we decided to leave him there.”