By: Sean Moylan
As much as they tried, no one could last even a minute against Josh Slezak, as the Scotties’ great 171-pound senior star recorded a trio of pins to lead the Bordentown High wrestling team to its second straight title in the Patriot Duals this past weekend.
"He got outstanding wrestler of the tournament," said Bordentown Coach Joe Sprague of Slezak, who started his season off by pinning Cumberland’s Marc Bidec in just 56 seconds on Friday night at Burlington City. "It took him less than two minutes to pin three guys this weekend. He gets after people."
But the Scotties, as a group, were easily the most outstanding team in the tourney with a 72-0 win over Cumberland on Friday, followed by a 48-21 win over Burlington City in the semi-final round and a 51-23 victory over Bishop Eustace in the finals of the Patriot Duals on Saturday at Bordentown. While a win over Cumberland was hardly a surprise, the huge margin of victory certainly was.
"We shut them out last year but they were improved this year," said Sprague of Cumberland.
It took Bordentown 103-pounder Sam Lamothe all of 66 seconds pin David Jones. Kam Singh (119), Ryan Gray (140), Tyler Sheehan (145) and Demetrice Sims (275) all posted easy first-period pins over their Cumberland opponents. Gray’s 42 second pin over Joe Harmon was the quickest.
Bordentown’s Lance Herner (125), Sean Talley (152) and Terrance Calhoun (215) all won by fall too, but their respective matches actually weren’t concluded until the second period.
The most competitive match of the day came at 112 where Joe Everitt nipped Chris Smith, 9-7. At 135 Justin Moore beat Jon Wallendan 11-6, 160-pounder Wayne Pullen beat T.J. Mitchell 9-3 and 189-pounder Thomas Lee beatCumberland’s Devon Pizzo 18-11. Karam Khalifa, the Scotties’ brilliant 130-pound star, won by forfeit.
While it was not quite as dominating a performance, Bordentown had little trouble getting by Burlington City on Saturday.
It took Slezak all of 32 seconds to floor City’s Omar Eldasher at 171. Bordentown’s Sims crushed Mike Walton in just 78 seconds at heavyweight. Lee, a budding star at 189 pounds, pinned the Blue Devils’ Dean Cotlett at the 3:07 mark. Khalifa (130), Gray (140) and Calhoun (215), who have all been standouts in the early going, also won by pin.
Alex Truby, Bordentown’s 103-pounder, pinned William Estelow in the second period. Singh (119) won by forfeit. And the Scotties were just as good in a win over Bishop Eustace in the finals.
"Going in we knew they (Bishop Eustace) had a few good kids. But none of our good kids lost matches to their good kids," said Sprague.
In fact, Slezak pinned John Rocco (171) in just 26 seconds while Lee needed just 49 seconds to pin Chris Salovski at 189. In a tough match, Khalifa (130) pinned Ben Knight with just 30 seconds remaining in the third period of their match, while Singh (119) floored Andrew Sims in just 43 seconds and Calhoun completed a perfect 3-0 tournament by pinning John Ogle (215) in just 74 seconds.
"Terrance Calhoun had a big weekend for us. And this kid Thomas Lee we have is tough," added Sprague. "From 152 to heavyweight we didn’t lose a match versus Bishop Eustace."
Talley started the run with a victory by forfeit at 152. Pullen came through with a big 4-2 overtime win over Dan Goldstein at 160. After the pins by Slezak, Lee and Calhoun, Bishop Eustace had no one to send out to the mat versus Sims, who was also finished the tournament 3-0. Truby (103) also won by forfeit.
"We were solid throughout the tournament," Sprague noted.
Bordentown (3-0) was scheduled to have wrestled in a match at Barnegat yesterday (Wednesday). It is scheduled to host a quad match on Saturday.

