East Catholic Tourney
All in all I'd guess EC is embarrassed by the tourney this year. Apparently refs weren't scheduled by the state, and nobody followed up from the school to check up on the state. Refs were eventually found, but the tournament was already compromised. Wrestling started about two hours late, switched to single elimination for the first round. All went well til about 2pm when it was decided to take all winners of consi QF contest for fifth place, and champ semi losers contest for third. The resulting revamp of the brackets crashed the system and the tournament stopped for another two hours.
Highlights from the wrestling:
145 - Veleas over Roberts 8-7
132 - Julian over Accousti 4-2 OT
126 - Hudson over Folino 12-6
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As a state we need to stop focusing so much on developing individuals and more on developing programs. Our overall participation numbers are dropping, the number of kids entered into the class tournaments is dropping every year, even as our elites get better and better the sport is withering away in this state. For every Danbury or Southington theres a New Cannan or a Joel Barlow who always have a few great wrestlers but can't even fill 10 weight classes this year. Then there's all the schools with only 7-8 (Or less) weights even filled, and coaches who don't see that as their biggest problem (which it is) If we as a state don't start building full programs, not just elites, the sport isn't going to be healthy here for long.