Greene, Brienza help St. Anthony's win crown

During a break in Sunday’s opening rounds of the CHSAA state wrestling tournament, St. Anthony’s Grant Greene explained the Friars’ plan for the rest of two-day competition: “We expect to win — by a lot,” the 119-pounder said.

Consider the plan complete. In what the Friars afterward called a dominant performance, St. Anthony’s finished with seven individual champions Monday and won its first Catholic state team title since 2002, scoring 286.5 points to overwhelm defending champs Monsignor Farrell, which had 225.5, and third-place Chaminade (207.5) at the Friars’ indoor athletic complex.

“Last year, Farrell beat us, but we knew we could come back and take it this year,” said Greene, who pinned Chaminade’s Glenn McKenna in 21 seconds in the 119 final. “Now we’re dominating and it’s awesome.”

Greene and 112-pound junior Jimmy Morris each won their second straight Catholic state title while senior Chris Brienza, at 103 pounds, took home his third consecutive championship. Morris won an 11-2 decision against Mount St. Michael’s Donovan Melendez. Brienza overcame a 5-2 first-period deficit to pin Farrell’s Paul DiStefano with 11 seconds left in the match.

Those wins were expected, but then 130-pound sophomore transfer Jamel Hudson put an exclamation point on the day with a 20-5 technical fall over top-seeded Joe Francolino of Farrell.

“I lost my voice screaming for him. A transfer coming out of nowhere?” Brienza said of Hudson, who became eligible for the Friars on Jan. 29 after transferring from Bay Shore.

Hudson is now 13-0 for St. Anthony’s and will join the rest of Monday’s winners at the NYSPHSAA tournament in Albany Feb. 26-27.

Others winners for St. Anthony’s were Brandon Meisner (160 pounds) and Jon Desir (285), who each earned pins in less than a minute. In the 189 final, Paul Alessandrini defeated teammate Rob Sweitzer, 8-3.

For Chaminade, senior 215-pounder Brendan Fowler won his 100th career match by pin in 1:43 over Casey Sheehan of Canisius. At 140, the Flyers’ Troy Sampson won 7-6 against Xavier’s Andrew Murano.

“We did pretty well,” Fowler said. “Sampson lost to that kid in duals a few weeks ago and has worked hard since. And we had kids wrestle-back tough that we didn’t think we would.”

That helped Chaminade pad its lead over fourth-place Kellenberg (144.4), which had two champions. At 96, Pat Skinner won, 14-6, against Farrell’s Blaise Rufo. Tom Re pinned Salesian’s Nick Terp in 45 seconds at 171.

The attention now turns to the overall state tournament in Albany later this month, which mixes public school competition with CHSAA and PSAL qualifiers. St. Anthony’s coach Tony Walters said his team has, “a great shot to win.”

“Some teams will take numbers to the state tournament, but I always say we take quality instead of quantity,” Walters said. “It was our goal in the beginning of the season to win a New York State team title and we’re on track.”