Hurricane Senior Wrestlers Come Up Big On Team's Senior Night

The Westhampton Beach and Half Hollow Hills West wrestling teams were knotted up, 27-27, on January 12, the Hurricanes’ Senior Night, leading to a winner-take-all bout at 138 pounds between Hurricane Randy Cabrera, who fittingly enough was a senior, and Colt Donghyun Lee.

Cabrera wound up edging Lee, 6-2, and with it earned a 30-27 victory for the host ’Canes, who were able to celebrate their second dual-meet victory of the season, due in large part to their seniors, all of which — except for Connor Gormley, who missed the match — won their bouts. That included Luke Citarelli, (126 pounds), Dominic Jurgel (172), Aidan McKeon (160) and Michael Hempfling (215), in addition to Cabrera.

“Randy has showed a lot of his maturity throughout this season,” Westhampton Beach head coach Pete DeTore said. “In close moments in the past, he would tend to panic and do some unusual move. This year he’s stuck to his game plan and I can’t be more proud of him and each of the seniors who all won their matches. We had a great match. The guys are really battling. They’ve certainly had their struggles and their ups and downs, but ever since the Cory Hubbard Duals, they’ve been showing all heart.”

Despite a 35-30 loss on Eastport-South Manor’s Senior Night on Friday, DeTore again liked the way his wrestlers competed, keeping it a close match to the very end. McKeon, Jurgel, Citarelli and Bobby Stabile all won their matches by pin while Cabrera won by decision and Sal Francapane won by major decision.

“It was very similar to the match with Hills with both teams toe-to-toe with the mat cheering their teams. It was the same thing at ESM, with our guys cheering each of their teammates on. It was great to be a part of and one of those moments where you forget everything that’s going on and it feels special.”

The ’Canes competed in the annual Kujan Brothers Memorial Tournament at William Floyd High School on Saturday. Citarelli won the 126-pound weight class with a 3-2 decision over Bellport’s Bobby John. Gormley placed second at 145 pounds and both Cabrera and Jurgel placed third. McKeon met up with teammate Brandon Cirincione in the 160 consolation finals to earn third and fourth place finishes for the team. Hempfling placed fourth while Stabile and C.J. Baynon placed fifth and Ryan Baynon and Nate Brandi placed sixth.

DeTore said it was his team’s first individual tournament since the East Hampton Sprig Gardner at the very beginning of the season and it was a nice change of pace from dual meet action. There were some tough teams, such as Plainedge from Nassau County, Bellport, host Floyd and Smithtown East.

“Last year wasn’t a normal year for most of these guys, and with the Hills East Tournament being canceled recently, this was a different kind of tournament for a lot of the guys,” DeTore explained. “It’s not like a dual meet where you have all of that support of your team. But like Finn McIntyre told me, it can also be more enjoyable in a sense because there are not so many eyes on you, it helps ease that pressure on some of the guys.”

To that end, Westhampton Beach will be competing in another individual, round-robin format tournament at Herricks in Nassau and will face Mount Sinai in a non-league dual meet, prior to the League V Championships, which will be February 5 at East Islip High School.