Wrestling: Edward Little grapples with Mountain Valley and Oxford Hills in first home meet

AUBURN — Oxford Hills won both of its matches at the Edward Little wrestling program’s first home meet on Wednesday.

The match between Oxford Hills, Mountain Valley and Edward Little marked historic firsts while sporting many familiar faces, most notably Red Eddies coach Ben Madigan and Falcons coach Gary Dolloff.

Oxford Hills defeated the Red Eddies 52-30 and Mountain Valley 49-16. The Falcons beat the Red Eddies in their match, 57-24. Vikings’ 2022-23 state champion Christopher Levesque won both of his matches by pin and Mountain Valley’s two-time state champ Lucas Libby defeated both of his opponents.

Madigan had much to celebrate with the Red Eddies holding their inaugural season’s first home match. Madigan, a Mountain Valley graduate was coached by Dolloff and won the 130-pound Class B state championship as a freshman in 2002.

Dolloff started coaching wrestling for the Falcons in 1987 and also coaches high school softball. Further intertwining the two, Dolloff also coached Madigan’s wife in softball when she was in high school.

“To watch Ben build this from a nothing program, to a pee-wee program with the dream of maybe a middle school program to then get it to high school … he’s just made me so proud,” Dolloff said. “I had goosebumps just starting the match, it was that emotional.

“I love the kid; I love what he’s done, and I know in a couple of years that program is going to be tough.”

Edward Little has also had individual wrestlers in past years who practiced with Oxford Hills and were coached by current head coach Tony Stevens. Sheldon Bang won a state title in 2014 for the Red Eddies while training with the Vikings.

The night started with matches between the Red Eddies and the Falcons, when four Edward Little wrestlers — Cooper Blair, Cash Thomas, Evan Madigan and Merlin Smith — secured six points each. For the Falcons, seven wrestlers tallied six points each and one added four.

“Tonight felt really solid, everyone wrestled their best,” said 175-pound class wrestler for the Red Eddies Izaac Martin-Poole. “Our first meet, we went 2-3, and this is our second one and it felt really solid. The second round (against Oxford Hills) definitely went better than the first, after a talking to from coach, and he is an amazing coach and I think he will continue to be. He’s been coaching for a long time.”

After just a month of practice, Martin-Poole said tonight’s result proves how good of a coach Madigan really is, and how well he has led the team so far.

Martin-Poole was one of three double winners for the Red Eddies, pinning both of his opponents.

Against the Vikings, Cooper Blair led a Red Eddies three-match scoring run, tallying six points via forfeit, Cash Thomas added another six by pinning Jayden Bishop and Evan Madigan finished the streak with another six points by pinning Matthew Denlinger. Oxford Hills scored 40 points after that and allowed Edward Little to score only six more.

Martin-Poole battled Eli Young from the Vikings in his second match of the night through the first period and nearly the entire second period, until he pinned Young.

“It wasn’t really a lead, it was more of a mistake that I caught,” Martin-Poole said. “I don’t remember exactly what it was, maybe arm hanging back, but whatever it was I saw it, muscle memory, and just went for it and held it.”

Martin-Poole also pinned Mountain Valley’s Grady Mack.

Evan Madigan (126 pounds) and Merlin Smith (190) were Edward Little’s other double winners.

Another standout for the Red Eddies was Lucas Goldrup, Ben Madigan said. Goldrup was able to minimize the points scored by Oxford Hills when he blocked a pin from Hunter Wormwood. The two exchanged power throughout the first period of their 150-pound match, which ended scoreless. In the second period, Wormwood appeared to have Goldrup pinned down, but Goldrup ultimately broke free after 10 seconds to hold Wormwood to four points instead of six.

“I was tired,” Wormwood said. “He was strong, and I couldn’t quite get him over. He was good.”

The Vikings junior said he has been working on pacing himself during his high school wrestling career, because it’s “easy to gas out right away.”

Oxford Hills coach Tony Stevens was proud of the whole team for how they wrestled, despite their age. Stevens said the team has a lot of sophomores and freshmen, but the senior leadership is strong.

“We’re usually pretty solid middle ways up,” Stevens said. “Sometimes you’ll match up and have a better kid at 120 or 126, so they’ve got to match up well on the other end, too.”

Stevens said this year’s team consists of athletes who work hard at conditioning and push the pace in practice. He also noted how much they support one another. Despite leaving Wednesday’s match with both wins, Stevens said the team needs to improve basic fundamental things as the season progresses.

When Oxford Hills wrestled Mountain Valley, the Vikings won all but four matches, and one of the losses was a forfeit. Levesque pinned Owen Gaudette in 3:43 in the 215-pound match. Levesque also pinned Edward Little’s Logan Billings.

Other double winners for Oxford Hills were Tristan Atwell (106 pounds), Jeremy Turner (132), Kendal Kovales (138), Sybastian Garey (144), Wormwood (150), Bryce Hazelton (165) and Dawson Mason (285).

Dolloff said he felt the Falcons showed up and were ready to go from the start.

“We wrestled great in the first the first matchup (against Edward Little), but then against Oxford Hills — tough, tough team — we lost a couple close ones that could have turned things around,” Dolloff said. “There’s also a couple wrestlers who are out right now, so hopefully we can get them back and make our lineups stronger.”

Colton Gallant, a freshman in the 144-pound class, surprised Dolloff on Wednesday in both of his matches. So did senior captain Nate Gamache.

“They both lost matches, but one was overtime and one was the last seconds of the match — and I couldn’t be more proud, they kept wrestling till the end,” Dolloff said. “My 138-pounder, Remi (Gauthier), I thought wrestled really well, too. He’s new to the varsity program, so I think every step is a good step in.”

Gallant, Gamache and Gauthier each battled the full three two-minute periods to hold their Oxford Hills opponents to three points.

In the 150-pound match, Gamache lost a 4-2 decision in overtime to Wormwood, who had two long matches Wednesday. Gauthier faced Kovales, dropping a 12-5 decision, and Gallant fell 11-2 to Garey.

“He would just keep getting me; I just couldn’t get out,” said Gallant about Garey. “I kept letting him up, and then he just got me in the end.”

Gallant said wrestling through all three periods is exhausting.

“It’s hard and it just gets harder, especially to beat them,” Gallant said.

Gallant has been wrestling for four years, three in middle school and now one in high school. He said the varsity level is definitely harder than middle school, but he wants to keep getting better.

“It’s cool that we get to wrestle more teams,” Gallant said about the Red Eddies program joining the high school ranks. “Their middle school team just came around last year, so it’s cool they have a high school team now.”

Gallant is one of five freshmen who hit the mat for the Falcons on Wednesday, and Dolloff said this year’s team is a good mixture of freshmen and experienced upperclassmen.

“These kids are like family, they work really hard together,” Dolloff said. “They have great leadership, Lucas (Libby) and Nate (Gamache) are great leaders. Lucas puts the gears down and makes them watch what’s going on.”

Libby pinned Edward Little’s Gavin Therriault and defeated Oxford Hills’ Curtis Fogg by a 12-0 decision in the 157-pound matches. Keygan Boucher also was a double winner for the Falcons.

Dolloff plans to continue increasing his wrestlers’ experience on the mat through what he called a “grind season” that he has put together. The next match for the Falcons is at home this weekend, when they host 17 teams, on Saturday.

“These kids are really going to learn by being in the fire, and I think by the end of it, once we get to regionals and stuff, the kids will be like, ‘Oh, this is a piece of cake,’” Dolloff said. “I’m hoping we can be in the top three in regionals and states, and maybe get a couple of kids to New Englands.”