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Best experiences/stories from State weekend


indianmorg

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I thought in the spirit of it being the greatest weekend of the year we can share the greatest experience/story that we have encountered during state weekend.  Mine has to be my first year as head coach and being FORTUNATE enough to coach such a hardworking kid that earned earned every bit of his state championship.  I say fortunate because I know some coaches go there entire careers (my dad being one of them, 20 years) without having the joy of coaching a champ under the lights.  Going down 5-0 in the first period, Jake wrestled his tail off to score 9 unanswered points to take the 195 title.  i do not coach anymore but I think about that match all the time and look forward every year to seeing a match where the underdog comes from behind to win a big one.  

 

I know there are some great/inspirational memories and stories from this weekend and look forward to reading them!

 

Best of luck to everyone this weekend and drive safe!

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Edited by indianmorg
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Excellent! Congrats. 

 

Mine, and I've mentioned before, but walking into BLF and walking into the concourse and looking up at the scoreboard and seeing the trackwrestling bout list with my kids name and bout big as heck right there on Mat 1!! After years of toiling in small arse gyms in various locales, struggling to pull up track brackets on my iPhone 2 in schools with little or no WIFI and having them take forever to load or drop, stalking his opponents profile etc..to see them big as life and LittleJimmy's name up there on the first one it just brought all the feels about the hardwork, sweat, and sacrifice and how it had led from 6 hour Sundays in little towns to watch 2 matches to the absolute mecca of high school wrestling. A very weird memory, I agree, but one I'll never forget and one that just seemed to hit hard and I still have the pic of it. 

 

This was year 2..lost year 1 pic! Oh..and kickin' it in a suite with @backtothemat. Southern folk are the best! 

 

Good luck to everybody this weekend! Soak it in. For some reason I'm not attending this year, but the beers are chillin', track video paid and I cannot wait for quittin' time! 

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Edited by UncleJimmy
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So my brother was a pretty good wrestler. 4x State placer, 3x state champ. I watched him wrestle at state his freshman year place 7th. Got to see every match of his that year. The next year I decided to sign a dotted line and joined the military. During his first state championship he beat a pretty good kid, named Eric Galka, I was in basic training and missed the match. During his second championship run, he beat another good kid, Anthony Quiroz, I was in Iraq at the time and didn’t see it in person. So during his senior year I made it a point to go see every match of his, near or far. He was going for his third state title, and 4x time state placer. Become the first Portage wrestler to ever do both feats. Still in the military I had something going on Saturday morning at state, got to see his Friday night match, but missed the quarters match. Sean didn’t have one point scored against him, he didn’t let anyone up, no escapes, nothing. Pure domination. Coach Wilkins who was the head coach at the time got me a coaches pass so I could go down with Sean, watch him warm up before the finals match, and be right there when he came off the match. He told me that one was for me. I finally got to see my brother win a state while I was standing by the warm up mat they have set up. By far one of my favorite memories I’ve ever had at state. 

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Lots of memories from a little guy watching the wrestling Gods under the lights.  But the ultimate memory was winning a state championship under the lights at Market Square.  There was more of a drive to put small schools on the map and know that it could be done.

 

To then coaching Mason Todd under the lights, alongside my longtime mentor Dave Cloud.  Amazing to experience both as a wrestler & coach.  

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From someone who is part of the PAC in Southern IN I thought a big highlight was seeing more PAC athletes representing at State this year. South Spencer, Southridge, Tell City, North Posey, HH and new PAC school Boonville all had some kids travel to Indy to put in some work in on the mats. It’s great to see some new coaches come in and fix programs that previous ones completely killed. Look at HH for example- Coach Zollman’s second year as HH head coach and already has had 3 kids qualify at state, one getting 5th yesterday, I could be wrong but don’t think they’ve had anyone since around 2012. I watched the previous coach ruin that program, exciting to see it’s coming back and impressive how quickly. Great testament  to his coaching and abilities. A guy you don’t want to coach against but happy he is helping represent your conference. Extremely smart pickup for them. NP, SS both with place winners. What a way to go out your final year with Stewart- congratulations & thank you Coach Packer. NP winning 1A Team State this year as well with Southridge and Tell City representing 2nd & 3rd as well. Exciting times for the PAC, happy to welcome Boonville & their stud to the conference as well! PAC wrestling on the ups! Proud to be a part of the PAC & continue to watch it grow! 

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