SANFORD — After a pair of losses on Monday to Biddeford and Marshwood in a tri-meet that head coach Nate Smith called “pretty rough,” and with the regional meet only a week and a half away, members of the Sanford wrestling team said they knew they needed a much better performance against Bonny Eagle on Wednesday night.  

And though the final score may not necessarily reflect it, the Spartans got just that against the Scots, nearly coming all the way back from a 22-point deficit halfway through before falling 46-27 in a dual meet at Veterans Memorial Gym. The end result, as far as the team score, didn’t go quite as he wanted, but Smith said was happy with his team’s improved performance.

“We wrestled kind of poorly on Monday, and they stepped it up today,” he said. “Bonny Eagle, this is one of their better years, and we have a lot of freshmen in our lineup. I have two of my varsity wrestlers out injured, too, so that match would have gone quite differently with my full varsity in there. It was good tonight.”

On a night when the Spartans celebrated their nine seniors’ last home match, three four-year varsity starters ”“ Jake Dexter, T.J. Dabrieo and Josh Downs ”“ all picked up victories by pin in three consecutive matches at a critical juncture.

With his team down 31-9 after six-straight Bonny Eagle match wins, Dabrieo started Sanford’s fight-back with a pin of the Scots’ Addison Bryant 54 seconds into the second round of their 132-pound match.

Downs followed with a pin of Rosanna Woodruff just 38 seconds into the 138-pound match, and Dexter finished off the streak with a second-round pin of Derrick Bryant in the 145-pound division to get Sanford back to within four points, 31-27.

“I pretty much just went out there and wrestled aggressive,” Dexter said. “We were down, it was kind of about getting momentum back swinging our way. I pretty much just had to go out there and do what I had to do. That’s my responsibility as a captain. Last time on this mat, I really wanted to go out there and show them what I’ve got.”

But the Spartans couldn’t keep that momentum rolling through the final three matches, with Robie Martin outpointing Sanford’s Chase Eldridge in their 152-pound match, and with Bonny Eagle earning pin victories in the 160- and 170-pound divisions that gave the Scots a 19-point team victory.

Though his wrestler came out on the short end of an 8-2 points decision, Smith said he thought Eldridge perhaps put in the Spartans most impressive effort of the night by taking Martin, one of the state title favorites in the division, all the way to the wire.

“Even though it was a loss, Chase wrestled really well against Robie Martin,” Smith said. (“Martin) dropped down to 152, and he’s going to be one of the bigger seeds in the region, and I think when Chase gets him at regionals, he’ll have a good shot at him.”

Before the Scots reeled off the six straight wins in the 220, 285, 106, 113, 120 and 126-pound weight classes to put the match nearly out of reach, Sanford had raced out to a 9-0 lead early thanks to a pin win from Justin Roberge in the night’s opening match at 182 pounds, followed by a 10-4 decision victory for Andrew Moriarty over the Scots’ Andy Martel at 195.

Moriarty, the third-place finisher at 182 at the Class A West regionals last year, had initially struggled with the move up in weight in the opening part of the season, but has been impressive over the next month, and Smith said he has a chance to improve his performance at regionals next weekend.

“He’s improved so much. He placed at the Spartan Invitational, he placed at Essex this past weekend, he’s kind of gone on a streak where he’s really knowing what he needs to do, staying in position and learning where he needs to be,” Smith said. “He’s going to surprise a few people next week.”

Before the Spartans head off to the regional meet at Marshwood on Feb. 2, they’ll have one last chance to fine-tune their skills against SMAA opposition on Saturday when they travel to Westbrook for a quad-meet with the Blue Blazes, Portland and Scarborough.

Like on Wednesday night, Smith will be paying more attention to the way his team wrestles than the numbers on the scoreboard.

“I think a few of my guys are going in a little more confident, and a few of my guys, even the kids that lost, are finding that if they’re more aggressive they’re going to find ways to score,” Smith said. “The matches that we lost we wrestled pretty aggressively, which is good to see, so I’m pretty happy overall.”

— Contact Staff Writer Cameron Dunbar at 228-1535, Ext. 323.