The Metropolitan Wrestling Association and Beat the Streets Wrestling, Inc., in conjunction with the Mayor’s Office, The NYC Sports Commission, the Harlem Armory and the three groups that offer high school wrestling in the city (the PSAL; the CHSAA; the NYSAISAA) will host the seventh year of the Mayor’s Cup of wrestling at the Harlem Armory. All the high school wrestlers from each group are invited to compete for team and individual weight class honors and to be the best wrestler in the largest wrestling city in the world.
The Mayor’s Cup Championship represents a chance to be the best in high school wrestling from the largest and best-known city in the world. This tournament has grown from 16 to 70 schools in its six year history. This January will be the seventh year of the tournament and the numbers keep growing.
To accommodate the increasing number of participants, in addition to adding a Female division and a Junior Varsity division, the tournament has used larger and additional facilities. For the third year the final weekend will be held January 30 and 31 at the PAL portion of the Armory in Harlem. The Sunday before, January 24, the Junior Varsity (consisting of any freshman–seniors not wrestling varsity) will hold preliminary bouts at two different sites.
A northern site, Truman H.S. in the Bronx, will host wrestlers from the Bronx, Queens and Northern Manhattan. A southern site, Wingate in Brooklyn, will host wrestlers from Brooklyn, Staten Island and Southern Manhattan. Winners from the North and South will compete at a finals the following weekend along with the Varsity and the girls tournaments.Having a lot of wrestlers from one school be successful has its benefits. There is a team championship award that is given each year. Monsignor Farrell has had the best showing and won the tournament with a comfortable margin. They had 298 points in the Varsity division. There is no team score for the girls division as yet, or for the JV divisions. Second place was Petrides with 185.5 points. Right on their heels was James Madison with 183.5 points. Horace Mann, Grand Street Campus and Mount St. Michael were close behind.
The success by boroughs parallels the team success above. Staten Island has had 33 champs the past 6 years. Brooklyn has had 27 champs; Queens 16; Bronx 11 and Manhattan 4 champs.
Only five wrestlers of the 14 weight classes return as champions from 2009. They are Tony Carlo and Ben Villaret, seniors from Monsignor Farrell. Two from the Bronx: Fordham Prep has senior Andrew Lenzi and Mount St Michael has senior Justin Ramsey Johnson. Madison H.S. from Brooklyn returns Gordei Tchekalenkov. We will have to see which weight class they fall into this year.
What else is there to say except: LET’S GET READY TO RUUUUUMBLE!
