Methuen unified in its goal to win it all
The past two years, Dom Gangi endured injuries that altered his wrestling seasons at Methuen
High. This year, as a senior captain, he is making his last push not just for himself, but for his coach, Bill James.
After each meet and tournament, now-head coach John Sughrue relays the results to
James, who continues to rehab from a shocking life-altering neck injury suffered in an accidental fall on Labor Day at his home in Salem, N.H., that left him with no use of his arms or legs.
Each time Sughrue has reported Methuen’s wrestling results to James, they have included wins by Gangi, who has led the Rangers to a 10-1 record and a win in the Dan Balboni Holiday Classic in Framingham Dec. 30.
“We want to make [James] proud, continue his legacy, keep that train rolling,” Gangi said. “We’re [Merrimack Valley Conference] champs, we want to do that back-to-back, we want to do that for him. This whole season has been for him.”
Gangi (113 pounds) and fellow senior captain Joey Bolduc (165) have been friends since they were kids, and had James as a youth coach. They are each on track for their best season.
“It helps when I’m doing it for someone we all love so much,” Bolduc said. “It almost boosts my will to go harder and do better.”
Sughrue is like many of the athletes he’s coaching in that he not only wrestled for James, but knew him before high school. Along with the Ranger captains, he is trying to maintain the atmosphere James instilled.
“The mission is the same that he had when he was head coaching,” Sughrue said. “For us to take that on, and take on that responsibility, we’re just doing the best we can on our end to follow in his footsteps.
“He taught us the way and we’re trying to pass that on to the next group of kids.”
Gangi’s coaches, including Doughboy Wrestling Club’s Mike Marshall and Dave Shunamon, helped him keep pushing for wrestling success. Gangi’s older brother, Joe, has been one of his biggest supporters as well.
It took mental and physical fortitude for Gangi to come back from a broken elbow sophomore year. Junior year, a groin injury had him wondering “Why me?”
“When I was in this dark place, not really wanting to come back, [Joe] pushed me to come back, to keep grinding,” Gangi said of his brother, a 141-pound sophomore wrestler at New England College, whom Dom will join next fall in Henniker, N.H.
“I still have a purpose. I had a purpose before anybody had an opinion of me,” Dom said. “The purpose is to stay on that path and to win.”
Though he was sick during the Lowell Holiday tournament last Saturday, Gangi defeated Tewksbury’s Nick Desisto, the 113-pound champion, 8-5, cementing his status as a top contender in the state.
With a 73-9 career mark and the confidence no one works harder than him, Gangi is ready for his last ride.
“I really want to show everybody the ability that I have, that
I’ve tried to show the first three years. [It was] taken away from me. I put the work in, I feel like it got stripped away from me,” he said. “I’m putting my mind to it, I’m putting my body into it.
“Getting the championship means a lot to me.”
Bolduc (108-18) had a breakout junior season, finishing second at sectionals, third at states, and fourth at All-States and New Englands. Sughrue and his brother, Paul, an assistant, were a big part of the mind-set change that resulted in Bolduc’s ascent.
“They’re very respectable wrestlers themselves,” Bolduc said of the Sughrues. “I’d score on them with a move and they’d tell me I could hit that on anybody. They boosted my confidence when it came to my skill, wrestling them.”
The team’s only non-senior captain, sophomore Vinny DeMaio (157 pounds), is a major factor in the team’s success as well. He finished second at sectionals, third at states, and fifth at All-States as a freshman.
He surpassed 100 wins a week ago, now sitting at 103-15.
“It was awesome,” he said. “I just felt like it was a good accomplishment but I’m always trying to look forward. I want to break the school record [212, set in 2014 by Christian Monserrat].”
James, who coached DeMaio since before high school, is always on his mind.
“It’s motivating, his absence,” DeMaio said. “Every day, it’s a constant reminder to work hard and keep pushing through it. End of the day, it’s all for him.
“All our success as a team comes from him.”
Near falls
■ Chelmsford sophomore Lucas
Farrell talks a big game, saying he can beat Thomas Brown .On Wednesday, he did.
In front of a big crowd, which included his family who were in town, Farrell turned a close exhibition match into a pin of the national champion heavyweight.
Farrell, who has Down Syndrome, has been training with the wrestling team twice a week for over a year. Coach Chris Piscione said Farrell’s participation has been the “best thing to happen to the program” since he’s been there.
“The crowd was chanting his name, I put the medal on his head, I gave him the trophy, he’s flexing,” Piscione said. “One of the best things I ever did.”
Brown, one of the first wrestlers Farrell met, was always on board. He gave one of his youth wrestling medals to Farrell.
“He’s a great kid, great to have him as part of a program, lifts up everybody’s mood,” Brown said. “It’s a great time when he’s in the room.”
At the Bruce Rich Invitational, Brown won the first Nik Sperounis Outstanding Wrestler award, named for his former teammate who passed away this past summer at age 18 after a two-year battle with cancer.
“My eighth-grade year I wrestled at the high school, the last athletic year he had,” Brown said. “It was great to be on his team.
“To get that belt named after him, and know the type of kid he was, and the hard worker he was, I’m honored.”
The Lions plan to get a new wrestling mat dedicated to Sperounis and David Tousignant, a former Chelmsford wrestler who won a state and New England championship at 171 in 1970 and died of cancer in 2009 at age 56.
■ Foxborough made a statement, winning the second annual Bob Gay Invitational at WhitmanHanson on Saturday. Connor McNamara (150 pounds) and Dylan
Melvin (175) won championships for the Warriors.