Ocean’s Shane Garrett going from Spartan to Hawk
February 2, 2023
So close, but not enough for Long Branch
February 2, 2023
By Coach Dave Porta, Photos by SportshotsWLB
Earlier this month Shore Regional defeated Keansburg 44-28 to finish 5-0 in our division and win our 9th ever Division Championship. Five of those division championships have occurred with me as the coach of the team.
The big matches for the championship this year have included the win over Keansburg and 36-28 win over Point Beach on January 4th. Shore and Point Beach have combined to win every single division championship in our division since 2007 so that match is always a big one.
First let me talk about the Point Beach match:
Shore won the bout split 8-6 and received bonus points in 5 of our 8 matches we won. We had absolutely huge wins by our Heavyweight Xavier Moro in a 2-0 win, and a 4-3 win by our freshman 106lber Trevor Doremus. Seniors 150lber Ty Koch, 215lber Bashaar Ismail and 126lb Dom Demarzo (who is a transfer from Long Branch) were monstrous in all getting us wins with bonus points in the match. 144lber Dom Sciarappa closed out the match with a 3-1 win to seal the win for us. It was our first time beating Point Beach since 2019.
Our Next Big win was against Keansburg. If we lost to them, we would be in a 3-way tie with them and Point Beach for the Division title. Keansburg also came into the match with a 9-1 record and is now 14-2.
Shore again was led by Ty Koch, Dom Demarzo and Bashaar Ismail, all getting us bonus points in their wins. Seniors Hunter Katz and Corey Norton added big wins for us, and Trevor Doremus sealed the win with a pin in :21 seconds to end the match and propel us to our 1st division championship since 2019.
As of today the team is now 11-6 and 5-0 in the division, with a lot of big matches left. We have the state sectional playoffs coming up.
We have very strong senior seasons from:
Hunter Katz who is 12-6, Dom Demarzo who is 21-6, Ty Koch is 18-5, Corey Norton is 11-9, and Bashaar Ismail is 20-4.
Adding to the magic this season were Trevor Doremus, who as a freshman is 16-7 at 106 lbs, sophomores Dom Sciarappa, is 8-7 at 144 lbs, Xavier Moro is 11-8 at heavyweight. Junior Lucas White is now 13-5 at 165 lbs and Jack Stetter is 12-10 at 175 lbs.
Recently Ty Koch and Bashaar Ismail also won the East Brunswick Holiday Tournament while Lucas White took 3rd, and Dom Demarzo took 2nd in the Red Bank Buc Classic.
In addition to that, Hunter Demarzo, Ty Koch, Lucas White and Bashaar Ismail qualified for the Shore Conference Tournament.
We have been aided as well by having a really strong coaching staff including newcomer Luke Ecklof who was a former state place winner for SJV and wrestled for Rutgers. He has been a difference maker in the team this year and has helped maximize every ounce of talent we can get out of our guys.
I myself won my 200th match as a coach this season and am now sitting at 226 career wins and am having just as much fun as I did 14 years ago. This team keeps me on my toes, and truly works as hard as can be to get the most out of themselves. There’s something special about kids that grew up together in town staying together and wrestling together for their home public school and putting it all together and having success. The boys truly have a bond together and feed off each other’s energy.
Below are the links to the box scores for our Keansburg and Point Beach matches if you wanna see them.
2022-23 High School Boys (trackwrestling.com)
