D’Attilo, in his first year as a varsity starter, wanted to wrestle in the Section 1 Division I Dual-Meet Championship matches, against Somers and the John Jay-Cross River-Horace Greeley winner. The Fox Lane junior ran off the additional weight and provided the Foxes with a huge lift in a 41-36 victory.
Fox Lane advances to the quarterfinal round Thursday against the winner of the Hendrick Hudson site.
“I was stressed,” said D’Attilo of his pre-school weigh-in. “I had to run to get the extra weight off and after I finished, I weight 114 on the dot.”
D’Attilo, who spent his freshman and sophomore years wrestling on Junior Varsity, posted a 15-3 major decision over Horace Greeley’s Andrei Nesbit in the 113-pound weight class. This gave Fox Lane the lead for good, at 10-6.
D’Attilo seized control of the match in the opening period with a takedown and added two points on a near fall.
“I was kind of worried, because I thought what if I had lost, then all of this hard work I had done would have been for nothing,” D’Attilo said. “Once I got out on the mat I was able to wrestle and do my job.”
The victory was especially important to D’Attilo because he was back at his certified weight. He wrestled in the 120-pound weight class at the Tony Carlucci Dual-Meet Tournament Saturday and was not pleased with his performance.
“When we got home Saturday, I called Matt to cheer him up and told him I wanted him to go down a weight class,” Fox Lane coach Anthony Rodrigues said. “He wrestled a tough match today. He was aggressive and went after his opponent.”
Rodrigues said it was nice to see D’Attilo respond with a big win, especially after a summer of hard work.
“It feels good that we were the two guys to get it started,” said D’Attilo of himself and 106-pounder Matt Grippi, who preceded him with a pin.
Fox Lane opened the day with a 66-6 thumping of Somers.
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