Mount Sinai wins division championship, moves on to state

Mount Sinai wins division championship, moves on to state

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Mount Sinai Mustangs after their victory against John Glenn Jan. 19. Photo from Mel Jacoby

Mount Sinai’s wrestling team is looking to make it to the top once again.

Mount Sinai High School wrestlers defeated John Glenn for a second time this season at Bay Shore High School Jan. 19. In a battle for the County D-2 Championship, Mount Sinai’s Mustangs turned around a 19-point deficit to start a winning run. After losing earlier in the season to John Glenn, sophomores Jack Tyrell and Brenden Goodrich along with freshman Joseph Sabella won their individual matches.   

“Everybody has a job — some people’s job is to make up those bonus points others are to not give up those bonus points.”

— Matt Armstrong

“We’ve had a great season so far,” said Matt Armstrong, Mount Sinai wrestling coach. “While some are young kids, when you get to some of the post season stuff, you have to be at a different level. Our kids really stepped up.”

Juniors Michael O’Brien and Joseph Goodrich along with seniors Joseph O’Brien, Vincent Valente and Michael Sabella all won their individual matches. John Glenn forfeited their match against junior Matt Campo, giving Mount Sinai the Suffolk County D-2 Championship title and sending them to Syracuse to defend their 2018 New York State title which they won for the first time in 2018.

During the 2019 season, both O’Brien wrestlers each had their 100th career win while Campo scored his 151st career win, breaking the school record set in 1995.

“100 wins is a big deal for Suffolk County,” the wrestling coach said. “To break 150 is really impressive, and he’s only a junior.”

“When you get to some of the post season stuff, you have to be at a different level.”

— Matt Armstrong

The Mustangs pocketed their first state title in 2019 in what the wrestling coach described as a perfect storm of ability and drive for the members of the wrestling team. Campo, among three other wrestlers, went undefeated during the state championships.

Armstrong said he is staying cautiously optimistic about Mount Sinai’s chances Jan. 26 when the team travels to Syracuse for the state’s Dual Meet Wrestling Championship. He added it will take the same sort of heart that last year’s team showed to pull off the same stunt this year.

“Everybody has a job — some people’s job is to make up those bonus points others are to not give up those bonus points, so we’ll see,” Armstrong said. “We really wrestled as flawlessly as we could last year, so we need some of that to go our way this year. Kids work hard, and they believe — that’s the biggest part of the battle.”