By Joe Pantorno, Sports Editor
The no. 23 Hofstra wrestling’s 10-0 start came to an end against no. 3 Cornell Saturday afternoon, 22-12, despite a pair of major upsets.
“We lost the match, so obviously it’s disappointing,” Head Coach Rob Anspach told gohofstra.com. “They’re a very good team and we went up there to win a match and we didn’t quite get it done.”
Hofstra sees its 15-match winning-streak snapped while Cornell improves its streak to 18 games.
At 184 pounds, Hofstra senior Ben Clymer, who was ranked eleventh in the nation, managed to pull out a 2-1 victory over third-ranked Steve Bosak. The upset was Clymer’s ninth straight win, improving his record to 23-5 on the season.
Redshirt junior Justin Accordino had a major win of his own at 149 lbs as he defeated 20th-ranked Chris Valalonga after a 30-second takedown. The win was also Accordino’s ninth straight as he improves to 19-8 overall.
“Justin did a really good job. We managed to take the wind out of their sails,” said Anspach. “It’s a great win for Justin against a ranked opponent.”
Redshirt sophomore Jamie Franco at 133 pounds and senior P.J. Gillespie at 165 pounds were the other two victors for Hofstra.
“Jamie did a great job,” said Anspach. “He went out there, wrestled hard…He did what he had to do to get the victory.”
At 125 pounds, junior Steve Bonanno had his eight-match winning streak end in a 3-2 loss to Frank Perrelli and sophomore Luke Vaith at 141 pounds, saw his five-match stretch end with a loss to Mike Nevinger.
“We need to work a little harder to get past him [Perrelli],” said Anspach. “The kid is very good, top five in the country, but we need to find a way to beat him.”
“We made some mistakes in crucial matches and we can better on them,” said Anspach. “We didn’t lose a match because of lack of effort or anything like that, there’s just a couple things we need to work on.”
Among other Hofstra losses were redshirt junior Tyler Banks (157 pounds), freshman Jermaine John (174), redshirt sophomore Tim Murphy (197) and redshirt junior Paul Snyder (285).
“We had some scoring opportunities, we just didn’t beat them,” said Anspach.
Hofstra is next in action this weekend, taking on no. 9 Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania on Friday and no. 18 Binghamton at home on Sunday.
“These are going to be some tough matches,” said Anspach. “They have some great guys. When you look at it on paper, it looks like a 5-5 split.”