The Walpole Wrestling Team had a dismal 2011-2012 record season, ending the year 2-14. The team came back this season with a bright and positive outlook. And they impressed everybody.
Walpole finished the regular season with a record of 14-9 in dual meets. But what really highlighted the team’s season was the post season. The rebels had four wrestlers in the Sectional Tournament Finals, sent five wrestlers to the Division II State Tournament, and sent three wrestlers to the All-State Tournament.
The trio included senior Captain Caleb Cofsky and juniors Kyle Robbins and Noah Kung. Robbins was victorious at the 182 lbs. finals bout. He won in overtime, a sudden- death victory against Woburn’s Mike Bentley. “It felt really good to win. I felt like I finally got what I worked so hard for this whole year and overtime made it even more dramatic and special, “said Robbins after the big win. Robbins is Walpole’s first sectional champ since the 2011-2012 season. Cofsky and Kung took second in the 132 lbs. and 220 lbs. finals bouts, respectively. The other two wrestlers who placed and moved onto the Division II State tournament were junior Trevor Wassel and sophomore Nick Glover. Glover took second place at the Sectional Tournament in the 120 lbs. bout and Wassel took 4th at the 160 lbs. weight class.
These five wrestlers all participated in the Division II State Tournament. Cofsky, Robbins, Glover, and Wassel all participated in the tournament last season, but this was Kung’s first rodeo. Wassel and Glover both lost their first two bouts and were out of the tournament by the end of the first day. Robbins won all of his bouts on the first day of the tournament and moved onto the second day. Cofsky beat his first opponent from Whittier by technical pin fall—meaning he was up by more than 15 points which ended the match then and there. He would lose to a very tough opponent next from Milton, and went into the consolation brackets. With a miraculous win over Winchester, Cofsky moved onto the consolation semi-finals. He would then lose to Catholic Memorial’s Paul Curtin and ultimately take fifth, beating Marlborough’s Erik Del Ciki. Kung also moved onto the second day of the tournament. He started off the second day in the semi-finals match against Central Catholic’s Ben Tavitian, who would go on to win the state tournament. Kung then would lose in the consolation semi- finals and ended the tournament in his last bout against North Attleboro, which he won to take 5th place. Robbins lost his first bout of the tournament on the second day due to a mishap that resulted in him being pinned while far ahead on points by North Attleboro’s Evan Packert. Robbins won his next match against Milford’s Justin Speroni to make it into the Consolation Finals and lost to Dracut’s Stig McElhinney. He took fourth in his weight class.
The trio went to the All-State tournament, a familiar place for Cofsky, who beat his first opponent from Marshfield and moved up the bracket to his next opponent Abbas Tamaradz of Hampton Charter School. Cofsky would lose this bout and square up against Brooklines Ricardo Magny, who he beat previously during the regular season, and he pinned him. He then faced a Nashoba Regional wrestler and lost to end his season. Robbins won his first round bout against Sabis’ Tyler Popec by pin in just 26 seconds. Robbins then moved onto the second round where he wrestled Bridgewater-Raynham’s Aaron Conrad and lost. Conrad went on to take first place. His next bout was in the consolation bracket where he lost to Norton’s Mike Travers, ending his phenomenal season. Kung’s first round was against Wakefield’s Alex Kane who he lost to by one point, 3-2. He went into the consolation brackets in which he wrestled post-season rival Dan Farina of Wellesley. He would win against Farina for the first time since they first met during the Sectional Tournament Final. The score of the match was 8-4, Kung. Kung then went on to wrestled against Greater Lawerence’s Luis Mateo, who he lost to, which ended his season.
Overall, the Rebel Wrestling team had a fantastic season. There was more of a sense of urgency amongst all the wrestlers and there was definitely more experience in dual meets as well as in practice. Highlighted by an extremely successful postseason, Walpole Wrestling had a great season and put themselves back on the map.
