SOURCE: www.pressconnects.com

November 10, 2017

Staying on the finals that don't necessarily offer finality, wrestling has a co-champion issue of its own. The state tournament, one of the oldest of all New York high school championships, used to play down to a single winner in each weight class.

That changed in 2004 when the NYSPHSAA individual tournament was split into large- and small-school divisions. Two days of competition culminates each February with the Division I and II finals settled on side-by-side mats.

One might make the argument that not playing down to a single champion is logical in team sports, where schools with larger student bodies have an obvious numeric advantage in forming their rosters. But the wrestling tournament is a one-on-one affair, and a competitor from a small school has the potential to be as strong and as skilled as one from a large school.

As it stands now, the two champions wrestle a total of four matches over two days. If they kept the two-mat format, the extra round of matches pitting Division I and II champions against each other on Saturday night would add just over an hour to the length of the session and once again crown true kings of the mountain.