NCCC cancels its post-season wrestling tournament

Avon’s Anthony Tripodi control’s Canton’s Trey VandeBogart in a match earlier this year.

AVON, Feb. 15 – For the second straight year, the NCCC cancelled its post-season wrestling tournament. A year ago, a blizzard forced the first cancellation ever of the long-time event. This year, an accurate forecast of a few inches of snow on Saturday afternoon forced the cancellation of the tournament on Friday.

League officials were concerned about the athletes getting home safely following the tournament. The event was scheduled for Saturday at Avon High.

“Nothing takes precedent over the safety of the kids,” said Barry Bernstein, the athletic director at Enfield High, who coordinates wrestling in the NCCC. “We were concerned about buses getting over Avon Mountain later in the day.”

And it’s not a short trip to Avon from Stafford, Somers, East Windsor or Enfield. It began snowing in the Avon area around 3 p.m. and there was about two inches of snow on the ground.

A year ago, the league tried to reschedule the tournament but the challenge of removing the snow from roads kept the tournament from being held. In fact, every athletic conference in the state cancelled their wrestling tournaments in 2013.

League officials declined to share information on potential efforts to reschedule this year’s NCCC tournament. They simply said it was cancelled.

With the cancellation of the tournament, Avon was declared as the league champion thanks to its 8-0 dual meet record. It’s the seventh straight league championship for the Falcons, who have won 51 straight NCCC dual meets since the 2008 season.

Usually, the NCCC uses a point system to determine the league champion with teams earning points for each league team they beat in the dual meet portion of the schedule and points for each team they beat at the league tournament.

The season continues for the teams in the league. They will be participating in the CIAC state tournaments beginning Friday and concluding on Saturday.