Minutemen Youth Wrestling

Brackets with four or less wrestlers will begin wrestling during the quarter finals round and will run until completed. Champions and Second place are welcome to stay for the announcement of finalist and will be announced as champion and runner up.

On Sunday, February 22 the Minutemen traveled to Bristol Central to compete in the highly competivtive State Qualifier.  Here are the results from that day:

Middle School Division:  Wrestling in the 128 lb weight class placing 3rd was Ricky Mullins, 98 lb Richie Schlitching placed 2nd, 91 lb Matthew Cote placed 4th,  Ryan Ogden 105 lb and Jordan Zima finished out of the top 4 places.

Novice Division: Sean Sullivan placed first at 90 lbs, Anthony Myers placed 2nd at 75 lb, Jared Zima placed 5th and Calvin Johnson was one win shy of placing.

Intermediate Division: Nicholas Zuk placed 1st at 111 lbs, Michael Patterson placed 2nd at 86 lb, Joseph Pettinelli placed 2nd at 76 lb, Issac Myers placed 2nd and Joshua Veleas placed 3rd at 61 lb, while Matthew Wojciechowski also wrestling at 61 lbs did not place and Mike Davila at 75 lb did not place but both wrestled tough on the day.

Coach Moss was happy to have the ten wrestlers advance to the State Tournament at Hillhouse on March 1st.

Coach the team on the day were Pete Veleas and Mike Patterson.

The Minutemen sent 23 wrestlers to the Red Eagle Tournament in Wethersfield on Sunday, February 15th.  The results were good for the home team and here are the results:

Wrestling in her first tournament Jenna Peck finished 4th in the Mighty Mite division. In the Bantam Division JP Gorneault took 1st, Mathew Peck and Gabriel Negrao took 2nd, Luke Mangiafico placed 3rd and Matthew Bouchard and Lorenzo Buccheri both finished 4th.

In the Intermediate Division; Nick Zuk, Cody Ruszczyk and Joseph Pettinelli took 1st, Matthew Wojciechowski and Issac Myers placed 2nd, Anthony Buccheri, Michael Patterson and Ryan DeVivo placed 3rd, while James Mazzarella finished 4th in a tough bracket.

Novice wrestlers finished with Anthony Myers placing 2nd, Tyler Bajjo placing 3rd and Jared Zima and Connor Ruszczyk finishing 4th.

Middle School wrestlers saw Richie Schlichting and Jordan Zima crowned champions while Matt Cote placed 3rd.

Coach Moss said, "It was the most wrestlers we have taken to a tournament all year and it was great to see the progress some of our younger first and second year kids have made."  Moss added, "We are winding down and getting ready for our own state tournament where we hope to crown a few champions."

The Youth State Tournament will take place on Sunday, March 1 at Hillhouse High School in New Haven for the Intermediate, Novice and Middle School Divisions.

The Bantam wrestlers will be competing in Meriden on Sunday, February 22nd.

The Berlin Minutemen Travel Team competed in the league tournament on Sunday, February 8th at Southington High School. Teams were represented by Southington, Wethersfield, Cheshire, Newington, Berlin, Hartford, Plainville and Meriden.  This is the first year for the league to help promote better wrestling for middle school students.  The Minutemen finished second to Newington in the team standings.

The Minutemen sent seven wrestlers of the nine that entered into the finals. 

In a round robin bracket Joseph Pettinelli wrestling at 75 lbs placed second losing to Brendan Zotti of Newington. 

Zachary Veleas wrestling at 80 lbs met  Mark Bargelski in an exciting match, Zachary fell behind after the first period 5-4, both wrestles scored in the second period to make it 7-6. In the third period Bargelski chose bottom and reversed Zachary for a 9-6 lead, Zachary quickly escaped to make the score 9-7 and then took his opponent down with 30 seconds to go to tie it up.  In the overtime period Veleas shot a takedown to secure the victory 11-9.

Next up was Matthew Cote at 90 lbs.  He faced Christian Zotti of Newington who was a tough opponent beating Cote by Technical Fall 13-0.

Sean Sullivan wrestling at 95 lbs faced Solomon from Southington who he had beat the week before in a rematch with Solomon beating Sean by pin.

Richie Schlitching faced Brian Amato of Newington.  After falling behind 2-0 in the first period, Schlitching was riding Amato when he escaped took him down and pinned him late in the 2nd period.

At 105 lbs. Nick Mangiafico took Nick Lamb of Cheshire into the second period before pinning him to become Berlin's second champion.

Jordan Zima wrestling at 119 lbs ran into a tough Chris Chorzepa from Newington keeping the score close after the first period before falling behind and dropping a 15-5 final to settle for second place.

The final Minuteman wrestling in to become a champion was Ricky Mullins at 126 lbs against Cheshire's Josh Hurihan.  After the wrestlers ended the first period scoreless it looked like the match would go the distance and be close to the end. Mullins chose bottom quickly escaped and then took his opponent down to his back for the pin.

Wrestling at 70 lbs for Berlin was Joshua Veleas who placed 3rd and Ryan Ogden wrestling at 112 lbs who placed 4th on the day.