NEW LONDON, Conn. --

In their second home dual of the season, #17 Coast Guard defeated the WPI Engineers by a final score of 44-3. The dual win is the sixth in a row for the Bears, a streak that started back in their first home dual, a nearly identical 40-3 win over Merchant Marine back on December 10th. The loss drops WPI to 5-4 on the season. They get back in action on Saturday January 17th at Trinity College(CT). At Trinity, the Engineers will go head-to-head with the host Bantams along with Roger Williams and Johnson & Wales. 

125 pounder Nikko Beato(San Diego, CA) got the Bears off to a strong start as he so often does with an 11-3 major decision victory. Fellow senior Owen Woolcott(State College, PA) followed Beato up with a strong performance but he made certain the second period would not be necessary in dramatic fashion, with a pin as the clock read 13 seconds left in the first. 

After Woolcott pinned his opponent with 13 left on the clock in the first, Dom Moyer(Milford, PA) brought his bout even further down to the wire. The sophomore earned a pin with just eight seconds left on the clock to ensure, like Woolcott, he would not need to step back on the mat for a second or third period. Following suit of achieving victory in the final seconds of a period, senior 149 Nathan Fitt(Branchville, NJ) got the Bears first technical fall of the night, scoring his 22nd point of a 22-7 win with four on the clock in the second period. 

With the crowd chanting his named, 157 pounder Mike Edwards(Glenpool, OK) brought the CGA lead to 25-0 with a 13-4 major decision victory before Landon Kearns(East Brunswick, NJ) notched a tech fall instead of major decision by the skin of his teeth in a 22-7 win at the end of the clock in the third.

Alex Hoffman(Lewisburg, PA), the Bears 174, won the first decision of the night for his squad. Hoffman took a dramatic three period battle by the tight score of 7-5. That drama from Hoffman's win seemed to be contagious when 194 pounder Chase Mayes(Nolensville, TN) took the mat. The freshman Mayes was trailing 0-3 in the second period when he flipped the script and made the score a moot point with a pin. The dazzling wrestling from Mayes brought the Coast Guard faithful to their feet and sent his team into an absolute frenzy after the pin. Carl DiGiorgio(Doylestown, PA) put the finishing touches on the team win without the need of any drama or late theatrics, notching a dominating 21-6 tech fall in under two minutes.

Following DiGiorgio, the Bears won each of their exhibition bouts as well, highlighted by a pin in just 16 seconds by senior heavyweight Tristen Carbonell(Winter Park, FL). 

Coast Guard gets back at it this Saturday at the Wildcat Open in Providence, RI hosted by Johnson & Wales. The Bears will look to stay hot in the new year with a 9:30 AM start at the Wildcat Center.