By Sean Williams (Staff Writer)
Senior 125 lbs. Steve Bonanno and junior 133 lbs. Jamie Franco opened the day with victories, but the 16th ranked Pride let a win slip out of their grasp against the 25th ranked Wisconsin Badgers.
The defeat dropped Hofstra to 0-2 on the season after a drubbing at the hands of no. 3 Minnesota.
Hofstra seemed to be outclassed in its match against the Minnesota Golden Gophers, losing 32-6., but didn’t have much more success against the Badgers.
“It wasn’t a very good weekend” Head Coach Rob Anspach summarized, a wry grin on his face.
Anspach went on to bemoan the difficulties Hofstra experienced trying to close the match against Wisconsin.
“At halftime we were winning, and all we needed was two of the last five matches, and we didn’t get them,” said Anspach. “To not get any wins from those guys was disappointing.”
While Bonanno and Franco took the early matches at 12-3 and 9-7, respectively, the team would falter soon enough, as junior 141 lbs. Luke Vaith and senior 149 lbs. Matt Spataro dropped back to back matches, leaving the Pride with a tenuous 7-6 lead.
Senior 157 lbs. Tyler Banks would help Hofstra out with a 6-2 victory and the Pride would go into intermission with a 10-6 lead.
The team would struggle from there on, however, as sophomore 157 lbs. Nick Terdick would drop his match.
Sophomore 165 lbs. Jermaine John would provide brief respite with a narrow victory, but junior 184 lbs. Taras Luzhnyy, freshman 197 lbs. Victor Pozsonyi, and senior 285 lbs. Paul Snyder would lose their matches to end the competition with a 18-13 loss.
“I wasn’t happy with the way the team represented themselves” Anspach said, but also emphasized that he isn’t worried. Anspach said that the team “has five more months before the CAA Championships, and there’s no reason to panic.”