Fairfield Warde three-peated at the 2025 Joe Sikorski FCIAC Wrestling Tournament a week before winning its second straight Class LL state championship.
Ridgefield’s Cole Desiano got a personal Triple Crown as an individual champion at the FCIAC and following two state championship tourneys and Fairfield Warde’s Dominick Spadaro, Jude Grammatico, Cole Grenier and Anthony Albanese were the four other conference wrestlers who also won multiple championships at postseason tournaments.
Those were just some of the many achievements which highlighted another very successful wrestling season in the FCIAC.
Two very successful longtime veteran coaches – Jason Shaughnessy of Fairfield Warde and Charlie Anderson of Trumbull – each had their respective teams win five dual matches on a Saturday to enable them to hit milestones for career victories.
A Fairfield Warde victory on Feb. 1 gave Shaughnessy his 500th career win and made him the sixth Connecticut high school coach to achieve that milestone.
Three weeks earlier Anderson became the 13th coach in state history to surpass 400 career wins and that includes the many victories he had at Norwalk High School before he became Trumbull’s head coach.
Desiano, Ridgefield’s superb sophomore, achieved his Triple Crown season by winning his 106-pound weight class at the FCIAC Boys Wrestling Tournament, CIAC Class LL Wrestling Tournament and then the CIAC State Open.
Desiano and Spadaro, Fairfield Warde’s senior 150-pounder, both won State Open championships two weeks after their conference titles and they were the two FCIAC wrestlers selected to the 2025 GameTimeCT All-State Wrestling First Team which consisted of one wrestler in each of the 14 weight classes.
Spadaro, Grammatico, Grenier, Albanese, Victor De Farias, Owen Sheiman, Louis Soracco and Dylan O’Brian were Fairfield Warde’s eight conference champions who led the Mustangs to their third straight FCIAC championship.
Fairfield Warde scored 281.5 points to win by a comfortable margin of 88 points over runner-up Danbury (193.5 points). Trumbull was just 2.5 points behind Danbury with 191 points. Ridgefield placed fourth with 162.5 points and Staples (110.5) completed the top five.
Fairfield Warde’s lineup of quality and balance was a key reason why the Mustangs defended their CIAC Class LL state championship even though they had two less individual champions than runner-up East Hartford.
Grammatico, Grenier and Albanese were Warde’s three Class LL state champions while East Hartford had five champions.
But there were three more Mustangs – Sheiman, Spadaro and Soracco – who placed second, and Christian Bernal Mendoza and O’Brian both placed third to help Fairfield Warde (260.5 points) finish with 40 points more than East Hartford (220.5).
The FCIAC had three teams finish among the top four and four among the top six at the Class LL state tournament. Ridgefield was third with 169 points, Danbury (150) placed fourth and Trumbull (133) was sixth.
Xavier was the State Open team champion for the fourth consecutive year with 189 points. Newtown placed second with 137, just three more points than East Hartford.
Fairfield Warde (127.5 points) and Ridgefield (112) placed fourth and fifth, respectively, and fellow conference member Danbury (62) was eighth.
Spadaro became a multiple postseason champion by winning a rematch in the State Open against Newtown’s Antonio Arguello, 5-4, one week after Arguello’s 5-1 victory over Spadaro in the state Class LL 150-pound final.
Prior to Spadaro’s FCIAC and State Open titles and state Class LL runner-up finish this year, he was a sophomore 126-pounder who was the State Open and Class LL state champion and FCIAC runner-up, and last year Spadaro was the FCIAC 138-pound champ, runner-up at the state Class LL tourney and third at the State Open. That is quite the high school wrestling résumé.
Grammatico had to beat a real tough opponent in Ridgefield’s Carter Lanzilli to win his two postseason titles. Grammatico first won by a 5-2 decision in the FCIAC tournament 113-pound final and then he nipped Lanzilli, 4-3, in the Class LL final. Grammatico, last year’s FCIAC 106-pound champ, placed fifth in this year’s State Open.
Grenier, who earned GameTimeCT All-State Honorable Mention kudos, defended his 190-pound championship at both the FCIAC and state Class LL tournaments. He was a swift closer with first-period pins in his championship matches in those two tourneys this year prior to placing third at the State Open.
Albanese improved one spot in becoming the 285-pound FCIAC champion this year after having been the runner-up in that heaviest of weight classes last year. He won by fall in the finals at both the conference and state Class LL tournaments this season.
There were 14 weight classes beginning with 106 pounds and ending with 285 pounds at the state tournaments.
The FCIAC’s championship tournament has 15 weight classes with the addition of the 99-pound division and De Farias of Fairfield Warde won that in a thriller when he nipped Westhill’s Isha Khanna, 11-10.
Sheiman, Soracco and O’Brian, Fairfield Warde’s three other FCIAC champions, also placed high in this year’s state tournaments.
Sheiman won his second FCIAC championship in the last three years. He won at 144 pounds this year after having been the 113-pound champion in 2023 and last year’s 126-pound runner-up. This year he was the Class LL runner-up.
Soracco (157 pounds) placed second at Class LL and fifth at the State Open. O’Brian (165) was third at Class LL.
Danbury was the only other team with multiple champions at the FCIAC Tournament. The two Hatters on the top step of the podium were Christian Pote (132) and Victor Velez (138) and Danbury also had three runner-up finishers on the second step – Harrison Muller (165), Eric Coons (175), and Justin Barker (215).
Pote got his second FCIAC title and went on to place third at Class LL and fifth at the State Open this year. He previously was the FCIAC champ at 106 two years ago and was runner-up at 120 last year. Velez placed second at this year’s Class LL state tournament.
There were five Ridgefield Tigers who placed among the top two in the FCIAC Championships.
In addition to Desiano achieving his Triple Crown, Lanzilli’s strong challenges while placing second to Grammatico of Fairfield Warde at the conference and state Class LL tourneys and then placing fourth at the State Open, Ridgefield’s three other FCIAC runner-up finshers were John Carrozza (132), Dylan Meyers (120) and Leo Moore (144). Meyers later placed fourth at the State Open.
After Carrozza lost by just one point to Danbury’s Pote, 6-5, in the FCIAC final, Carrozza then placed second at the Class LL state championship tourney, third at the State Open and was one of the five FCIAC wrestlers who earned GameTimeCT all-state kudos.
Ridgefield’s Desiano and Fairfield Warde’s Spadaro were All-State First Team, the FCIAC wasn’t represented on the All-State Second Team, and Carrozza, Warde’s Grenier, and New Canaan’s Dylan Mastroianni were all All-State Honorable Mention.
Mastroianni was the FCIAC 175-pound champion and third at both the state Class L and State Open.
Staples 120-pounder Seamus Brannigan and Trumbull 126-pounder Ibrahim Kadri were both FCIAC champions and then second at the Class LL state tournament.
Isiah Dominguez of Norwalk was the FCIAC 215-pound champion who went on to place fifth at the State Open.
The FCIAC champions were the 15 wrestlers selected to the 2025 All-FCIAC First Team, and the 15 who advanced to the conference finals wrestled their way onto the All-FCIAC Second Team.
Fairfield Warde’s Christian Bernal Mendoza was the FCIAC 106-pound runner-up prior to his vital third-place finish at the Class LL tourney.
Elijah Kelly (126 pounds) and Andrew Sakey (190) of Fairfield Ludlowe, Damian Rousseau (157) of Staples, and Trumbull’s Gabriel Rojas (138) also placed second at the FCIAC Tournament.