It was a true team effort when Newtown High School’s wrestlers traveled to the Tsongas Center in Lowell, Mass. December 22-23 and became the first Connecticut school to win the George Bossi Holiday Tournament in the more than five-decade history of the event.

A couple of things that make this triumph especially notable are the fact it is the largest tourney in New England with more than 90 teams and 1,000 wrestlers from all of the New England states and that Newtown did not have a single individual weight class champion.

“We’re pretty proud of that. It was a team effort. We won the tournament without a single champion and it was a razor-thin victory,” Newtown Coach Chris Bray said. “Every single match we wrestled the entire weekend counted.”

This tournament has been a December fixture on the Massachusetts wrestling calendar since 1968. Bossi, 89, has been coaching at Lowell since the 1964-65 season and started this tournament in December 1968. The tournament is named in honor of Bossi, the Hall of Fame coach with Lowell High, who was inducted into the Massachusetts Chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2000.

Newtown put two wrestlers in the finals and had four wrestlers finish third to help the Nighthawks outlast Haverhill, Mass., 215.5 to 210.5 to win the 55th edition of the tournament. The Nighthawks won thanks to 23 pins from the six wrestlers who medaled. Extra points for pins were crucial in a tournament decided by five points. Haverhill High School finished second for the second consecutive year. A year ago, Haverhill finished one point behind Massachusetts-based Shawsheen Valley Tech.

Newtown’s Tom Milligan, who was second in the 106 pound division, was 5-1 with three pins, and Fisher Stites, who was second at 165, was 5-1 with four pins. The four Nighthawk wrestlers who finished third combined for 16 pins with Jon Dasilva (285) getting five pins, Antonio Arguello (144) and Jake Maddox (150) tallying five pins, and Marc Maurath (157) logging three pins.

Crucial team wins came from Kenna Gioffre, Thomas Morgan, Andrew Corey, Charlie Dunn, Grayson Renkert, Ty Jorgenson, and Dante Ames.

“They gelled. Everybody was performing for the team and themselves. I think it made our team closer at the end of the day,” Bray said.

In addition to picking up this year’s tourney title, Newtown’s program is the only one in Connecticut to have finished second in this competition; NHS was runner-up to Chelmsford, Mass., in 2015.

Team results: 1. Newtown 215.5; 2. Haverhill, Mass. 210.5; 3. Shawsheen Valley Tech Mass. 179; 4. Bedford, N.H. 156; 5. Coventry, R.I. 151.5; 6. Fairfield Warde 140; 7. Milford, Mass. 127; 8. Andover, Mass. 126.5; 9. Salem, N.H. 126; 10. Tewksbury, Mass. 125; 11. Simsbury 124; 12. Central Catholic-Lawrence Mass. 122; 13. Timberlane Regional N.H. 120.5; 14. Greater Lowell Mass. 120; 15. Chelmsford, Mass. 116. Other Connecticut teams that participated: 19. Southington 113.5; 44. Stratford 70; 68. Staples 34; 73. Lewis Mills 30.5; 74. Norwalk 30; 75. Hall 28; 90. Sheehan 16.

=====

Sports Editor Andy Hutchison can be reached at andyh@thebee.com.