Gardner Wrestling Tourney a Gripping Event

The smoothest-running Frank (Sprig) Gardner wrestling tournament in the five years that Ethan Mitchell has been coaching at East Hampton High School took place on three mats there from 9 to 5 on Saturday as some 150 competitors representing East Hampton, Sachem North, Mount Sinai, Ward Melville, Bayport-Blue Point, Hampton Bays and Southampton vied in 14 weight classes that ranged from 103 to 285 pounds.

It was the 47th year of the event, which honors Frank (Sprig) Gardner, the founder of collegiate-style wrestling who began his career at East Hampton in the early 1930s.

Sachem North, last year’s county runner-up, was the tourney’s winner, with 331 points; Mount Sinai, with 171, was second, and East Hampton was third with 158. Mitchell entered 26 of his 40 wrestlers. Ten of them were placewinners, with senior Franco Palombino, the 285-pound champion, senior Juan Espinoza, the 215-pound champion, and junior Bronco Campsey, the 126-pound runner-up, leading the way. Sophomores Caleb Mott, at 150, and Brian Torres, at 175, were finalists, the first time that each of them had advanced to that round.

The final that pitted Campsey, a state finalist last year, against Ward Melville’s Jaden Baron was arguably the day’s most dramatic match. The wiry, curly-haired wrestler from Sag Harbor took Baron down for a 3-0 lead midway through the first period, but, to everyone’s surprise, the Ward Melville wrestler put Campsey on his back moments later with a headlock for a 6-3 lead.

It was 6-4 Baron entering the second period. With 31 seconds left, Campsey, after letting his opponent stand up, took him down again to even things at 7-7.

And there the score stood throughout the third period and three successive overtime periods, though Baron was awarded an ultimate tiebreaker victory in the last of these owing to the fact that Campsey, who had begun the third OT on the bottom, with Baron in the top position, had failed to fully escape from his opponent’s grasp before putting him to his back just before time ran out.

“Bronco’s always thinking about pinning people,” Mitchell said when questioned afterward. “If he’d had a little more time, he would have … it’s better that this loss happened now rather than in February. I hadn’t thought the match would be that competitive — credit the kid and his coach.”

Palombino, a 220-pounder who wrestled up, and Espinoza finished off their final-round opponents in exciting fashion. Palombino was taken down by Sachem North’s Giovanni Avila in the first period, but the Bonacker quickly reversed things 30 seconds into the second, clamping on a pin hold as he rose up from the bottom position, a decisive move that had Bonac’s coaches and fans shouting.

Espinoza’s showdown with Ward Melville’s Logan Schaefer was scoreless in the first period. Espinoza earned a point for an escape near the end of the second, and Schaefer escaped 35 seconds into the third, resulting in the contenders, tied now at 1-1, going head-to-head. After fending off a Schaefer takedown attempt, Espinoza, with 20 seconds remaining, bear-hugged his opponent and tripped him, a strong move that earned him three takedown points, three back points, and a 7-1 win.

“Juan wrestled very smart at the end there by not going out of bounds, which would have resulted in a restart,” Mitchell said.

It was the second year in a row that Espinoza had won a Sprig Gardner title. Last year, he defeated his teammate Palombino in the 215 final. It was the second Sprig championship also for Palombino, who was a winner at 285 two years ago.

Aside from the above, East Hampton had five other placewinners: Matias Gonzalez, a senior, fourth in the 165-pound class; Orson O’Brien, a sophomore, fifth at 215; Ben O’Sullivan, a junior, sixth at 157; Aiden Gavilanes, a junior, sixth at 165, and Chris Amay, a junior, sixth at 190.

Of O’Sullivan, a second-year wrestler, Mitchell said, “He had a great tournament, and would have placed higher if a knee injury hadn’t forced him to forfeit in the consolation’s semifinal.”

As for the season to come, Mitchell is sanguine. The young Bonackers ought to be competitive, he said, though it’s likely that he won’t have entrants in the 103-, 110- and 118-weight classes. Because of lower enrollment, the team has been moved down from League III to V, with Smithtown West, Hauppauge, Comsewogue, West Babylon, West Islip and Eastport-South Manor, where East Hampton is to wrestle in its first dual meet this Friday, December 12, at 5 p.m.