By Ted Waddell
MONTICELLO — February 14, 2006 – In last Monday night’s non-league wrestling match between the host Monticello Panthers (8-6) and Kingston Tigers (3-9), the visitors prevailed 52-29.
Before the match started, 17-year- old Monticello senior Anthony Ng was honored with a special ceremony to commemorate the fact that he recently broke the school record for most career varsity wins. The previous record of 104 victories was held by Marcus Hutchins.
By defeating Kingston’s Kerry Broughton, 17-0, on a technical fall 3 minutes and 50 seconds into their 135-pound match, Ng improved his career record to 108 wins versus just 23 losses. The win against Broughton boosted Ng’s record for the 2005-2006 season to 31-5.
During the pre-match ceremony, Ng was presented with a large framed photograph of himself in action during last year’s Section IX finals at Monroe-Woodbury High School.
As he took to the mat, Shanne Waknine and Rebecca Concors, a couple of 14-year-old ninth-graders at Monticello High School, showed their support with their faces painted in white glitter. Concors and Waknine also waved a sign congratulating Ng as Monticello’s “#1 Wrestler.”
“I thought it was fabulous,” Anthony’s father, Peter Ng, said of the ceremony. “It brings back many fond memories over the last five years.”
The elder Ng said he was proud of the positive relationship established between his son and Monticello Coach Ed Kaufmann.
“They have a special bond that really blossomed his talent, and I’m equally proud to see the sportsmanship that Anthony has displayed over the years,” Peter Ng stated.
Recalling his son’s championship match during the 2005 Section IX finals in which the younger Ng lost in a split second in the second overtime when a part of his body hit the mat, Peter said, “He was so close, yet so far… that made him number two instead of number one, but he went over and shook the hand of the other team’s coach and congratulated his opponent.
“He shook hands with everybody as he walked off the mat,” Peter Ng added.
Anthony Ng’s older brother Chris wrestled at Monticello, and is now a freshman at Boston University. The brothers’ mother, Marie, serves as the “Team Mom” for the Monticello wrestling squad.
“I started when my son Anthony was in eighth grade,” she said. “He’s a super boy, not only bright and smart, but he’s a good person inside… and he’s a good wrestler, hard-working and determined.”
Ever since she put on a T-shirt labeled “Team Mom” for all the world to see, Marie Ng has followed the Panthers’ team bus to all of the meets.
“I haven’t missed a match since eighth grade,” she said. “The team is just like a family, and the camaraderie is just wonderful.”