East Hampton/Pierson Wrestling Has Its Best Showing at Its Host Sprig Gardner Tournament in Over 20 Years, Showing Promise for a Strong Season

After graduating a pair of five-year varsity wrestlers in Santi Maya and Caleb Peralta, who very much kept the East Hampton/Pierson wrestling program alive during their tenure, the program now heads in a new direction — and if this past weekend’s Sprig Gardner Tournament is any indication, the team’s path to success could be shorter than initially thought.

East Hampton placed second at its 44th annual host tournament on Saturday, the highest placement by far since at least the turn of the millennium, according to head coach Ethan Mitchell. The Bonackers had a pair of champions, something they hadn’t had at their host tournament since Andreas Koutsogiannis in 2018, with sophomore Juan Roque at 118 pounds, who pinned all four of his opponents, and senior J.P. Amaden at 138 pounds, who won his finals match by pin with four seconds remaining, both accomplishing the feat. They also had a pair of runner-ups in sophomore Anthony Petersohn (110 pounds) and senior Jose Calderon (172), and four wrestlers who placed third in senior Cooper Ceva (145), sophomores Adam Beckwith (160) and Aman Chugh (189) and first-year senior wrestler Richie Maio (215).

Ward Melville won the scramble-style formatted tournament with 287 points, followed by East Hampton with 275.5 points, Bayport-Blue Point (271.5), Westhampton Beach (256), Hampton Bays (205.5), Southampton (106) and Center Moriches (81.5). Every Bonacker who competed in the tournament won at least one match. In the 13 different weight classes, East Hampton submitted wrestlers in 10 of them and had someone place in all of them, eight of which had someone place third or higher.

“If you asked me before the tournament if I thought we could take second, I would have said no way. East Hampton has not finished above fourth place since before 2000. I went through all the record books,” Mitchell said. “Everybody wrestled really tough, and it wound up being the four third-place finishes that did it for us, resulting in us beating Bayport and Westhampton. All those guys either lost in the semis or somewhere during the day, and so that’s really the best part. They won matches they were losing, they never stopped fighting or never gave up. Some kids fought off their backs to avoid getting pinned so they could keep wrestling.”

What may be more impressive about the Bonackers’ accomplishments is that they were missing a few wrestlers who Mitchell thinks will be key for them this season, either due to injuries, illnesses, SATs that were administered the same day as the tournament or ineligibility due to not having enough practices. Amaden, Ceva and Calderon are just half of the team’s returning seniors with varsity experience, along with Alex Hatgistavrou (132), Isaiah Robins (126) and Steve Bacalema (172). Of the 47 wrestlers Mitchell is starting the season with, 17 are seniors, 11 of whom are first-year wrestlers, like Maio who placed this past weekend.

Juniors Luke Castillo (138), Jhojairo Contreras (172), Jack Cooper (172) and Pierson’s Gus Hayes (160) are also returning along with a strong sophomore group that includes Roque, Petersohn, a Springs resident who had attended Xavier High School in New York City prior, Chugh and Josue Elias, who placed sixth at 126 pounds at the Sprig Gardner. Bronco Campsey, an eighth-grader who Mitchell is very high on, didn’t wrestle on Saturday.

All in all, around 350 matches were wrestled on Saturday, which is what every team wants and needs in its first tournament of the season. Especially considering that many youth wrestling programs, particularly on the East End, were hit hard during the pandemic, many coaches are now noticing that they are getting less experienced, older wrestlers because of that fact. In that sense, the tournament was again a huge hit for everyone involved.

Just to put that into perspective, this upcoming Tuesday, December 13, will be the first kid wrestling night in East Hampton since January 2020.

“It was a long day and it was a lot, but that’s why we do it,” Mitchell said of the tournament. “For so many Bonackers that haven’t wrestled before. But it wasn’t just us, all the teams there had a lot of new, fresh guys. Our seniors were freshmen when the pandemic happened, our juniors were eighth-graders, our sophomores didn’t even have a middle school season, so a lot of this is all new to them.”

One thing that will help East Hampton this season is the fact that it was moved up from League V to League IV due to larger enrollment numbers. While facing larger schools may not sound all that appealing, leagues V and VI in Suffolk County tend to be the most competitive with some of the top-ranked teams, not just in the county, but in the state, competing in them. The Bonackers will now battle Bellport, Deer Park, North Babylon, West Babylon, West Islip and Smithtown West.

After sending eight of his wrestlers over the summer to the Kutztown wrestling camps, the potential is there, Mitchell said, for his team to win a few league dual matches for the first time in a couple of years. After this weekend’s success, Mitchell may have downplayed a few of those matches and it could be more than a few.

“I’m excited, as always,” he said. “The kids look supercharged in the wrestling room, and the move from League V to League IV is much more manageable. We don’t have four top 10 teams in the league.

“You have to call it a rebuilding year being that we’re not returning any accolades. We have no kids who have any sort of resume or anything,” Mitchell continued. “Which I love because people are going to sleep on Amaden and Ceva, and so I’m looking for them to have breakout senior years. Then those young guys in the lower weights, like Bronco, Juan, Anthony, Josue, they’re going to do a lot of great things for us.”