ENoblewrestling

Does anyone know what the BTN wrestling schedule looks like for this season, I cant find it anywhere.

Perfect, but they have to look cool too. That way I can still look hip, but have the comfort i'm looking for. Also it was kind of false advertisement, its more the fact that I am too lazy to get on the mat anymore, than that I am too old.

I am bored, and I am getting some new wrestling shoes. Any recommendations out there for an old coach that will mainly be using them to walk around the wrestling room and yell in? Also has anyone wore the new Varner's, they look cool, but seem like they could get dirty real easy. If anyone else has anything else wrestling shoe related to add to this discussion please feel free.

Sam Riesen Churubusco

I'm trying to get some of our cross country kids interested in wrestling. Just wondering if there are any kids that are excelling in cross country this year who also wrestle.

Joe what do you want to do in a situation where a school has spotty historical records past a certain date? For example we have ours up until about 1988, but have spotty year by year records before that? We do have a few of the previous coaches career records though...

This seems like a really cool idea. I wish I would a thought of it.

http://www.indystar.com/story/sports/high-school/2014/08/08/interactive-how-indiana-compares-to-us-high-school-transfer-rules/13779215/ I just saw this on the GID. Thought this was interesting. It has the transfer rules from other states in the country. Its crazy the number of states that you have to sit for an entire year if you transfer.

We have used excel since I have been here, this year we are looking into getting a stats program to make it easier on our managers, does anyone have any that they would recommend?

We go to West Noble at the start of the year, Goshen mid December, Carroll around Christmas, and Westview toward the end of the year. All are well ran, I would contact they're AD's or coaches.

We are getting new record boards in our gym. Im curious as to how other schools have handled the weight class changes with this type stuff? Did you use the new weights, keep the old weights, or combine the weights in some way? will these weights be around long enough to design the board around them?

Can someone tell me if I am watching the actual championship matches or one of the lesser ones? All joking is 1A big schools or small in Illinois?

it was with-in the last five years, probably 2-3 years ago.

I never knew that, which ones are you referring to? I honestly ask because in 100% of the experiences that I have had with the coaches association I have dealt with a bunch of guys who volunteer their time to do what is best for the sport in Indiana. I literally have never felt that the people that I volunteer to work with to help our sport are shady or liars ( I have only been doing stuff with the IHSWCA during presidents Cale Hoover, Trent McCorrmick, and Danny Struck time). I get that you don't agree with the IHSWCA association on a lot of things, but that doesn't make them shady, or liars. Do you have any thing to make your claim valid, just throwing unsubstantiated accusations out about a group of volunteers seems fairly shady to me.

Having more tan 10-20% of the coaches in the state supporting a move to class wrestling would probably help too. Just because a very vocal minority (again somewhere between 10 and 20% of the coaches last time it was surveyed...I don't have the exact numbers) say they want something doesn't mean it's going to happen. Hell something like 85% said duals were the best way to determine the team champ and we see where that got us. I doubt they care what 10 guys on indianamat think.

Couple of thoughts- We have this debate every year. In the end it doesn't matter what the coaches want, what Y2 wants, or what anyone wants. In the end it is up to the IHSAA. They will do what they want. If they wanted class wrestling we would have it. If they continue to not want it we won't. I think we should also note that as far as coaches go in the state the last time it was surveyed the coaches voted that a 1 class tournament was the way to go by a very large margin (80-90%). If we were to ever have class wrestling do you think that it would matter that the smaller school kids would be seen as winning a "lesser tournament"? We have finished second and first at the first two class team states. We have received a ton of praise, and are viewed as being state champs. We are proud as hell of our accomplishments. When you look at the message board though there is much more discussion about the bigger classes. Look at the qualifying thread from this years state. Class 3A has 6 pages worth of discussion, class 1A has 2 pages. Getting to team state at any class is a huge deal, winning it was awesome, we celebrate it like any other team would a championship (so no Y2 we didn't throw our titles away), but at the same time it is noticeable that the other classes matches and titles are viewed as being bigger, and they should be in terms of a discussion of who is the best team overall. Those teams are better than we are, and in a team competition the size of the school makes a difference. Individually though I would have a hard time with my guys competing in what would be viewed as a lesser tournament. I think it would be tough for me to have my guys that can make it to state in a 1 class tournament, and tell them that because they go to Churubusco they are not good enough to compete with the individuals from the big schools. I'm just curious what others would think of this. As far as colleges go, do you think that competing at the small school level would hurt the kids that are actually good enough for D1 or D2 to get recruited based on the fact that they were at small schools (I know it didn't hurt Steiber)? One final thought, I know that the wrestlers who make it to semi-state for us get a ton of letters from various D2, and D3 schools around the midwest. I would say colleges are smart enough to know that good wrestlers make it to semi-state, and don't just recruit state qualifiers, but semi-state as well. Do we really need to class the tournament to get our guys recruited?

as far as the bottom 105 not setting the world on fire, plenty of those teams were at semi-state, so they had a legit shot at a stater imo. im not saying the kids that dont make it to state are not working hard at all, it pry came off that way, i spent a while trying to decide how to word that, it came off wrong. our staters have been our best atheletes and they have worked very hard as well. our kids that havent made it to state have also been good atheletes and have worked hard. hard work alone doesnt get a kid to state, there are a lot of things that go into it. our hardest working kid that i have coached was zack armstead, he came up just short of making it to state, it didnt mean that the four that made it worked any harder than him, or that they were better atheletes. it does mean that they either where better wreslters, or had a better match or two at some point. zack armstead, or any of my kids that didnt make it to state didnt make it due to the fact that they were either out worked, out wrestled, or had some bad luck during the tournament. the fact that they went to a 1a school was not the reason that any of them didnt make it to state.

This year was lower than most years. This debate happens every year and usually a little more than 25% of the state qualifiers are from 1A schools, and about 25% of the students are from 1A. That is a ratio actually says to me that 1A school do better than they should by just a little bit. This year the number seems lower than most years. The semi-states have their fair share of small school guys. I also think that making it to semi-state is a big deal, to me you have a real shot at state from there, its usually a difference between winning and loosing a close match, so I would say that yes we compete very well in that regard. As far as kids not having to work hard, that is not what I said. Our kids that don't make it out of sectionals all work hard. Every kid who is at semi-state works very hard, or has a ton of natural ability, that doesn't mean they should just become state qualifiers. I am sure the classed kids work very hard. My kids work hard, they would work hard if it were classed. The kids that make it to state now are very exceptional, in a classed system you would just have to be really good to make it, instead of exceptional, thats the difference to me.

Two of our semi-state qualifiers lost in a dual with Carroll's B team.

The IHSWCA surveyed this a few years ago, and the vast majority, at least 80% of the coaches said that they did not want it (it may have been closer to 90% I cannot remember). I coach at a small school, we have had a fair amount of success. I have been very open about my opinions on class wrestling in the past. I will say that I have changed in this regard, while I don't think that class wrestling would add much for anyone, I also don't think that it would completely kill the sport here either. For us it would just mean that all of a sudden our regional, and semi-state guys would be called state qualifiers. The kids have said as much when we discuss this and it would be what it would be I guess. My kids that want to become better wrestlers and challenge for state do so. They work in the off season and go to camps. They are usually pretty successful by the end of their careers. The kids that would be helped by class wrestling are the ones who are on the team, but don't put in the extra time to get better, they would all of a sudden move further on in the tournament, and would be able to do so by doing what they are already doing. I think that small schools can and do compete pretty well in our state. I never feel as though I our my kids are somehow cheated by the system. OUr kids have been state qualifiers, and those that have made it are the ones have are the best athletes, and the ones that work the hardest. This is the same at schools of any size, it just so happens that big schools have more kids that work harder and are better athletes. In my opinion my top end guys are at no disadvantage because they wrestle for us as opposed to anyone else. Sometimes I do think about what it would be like to have classed individual state, and I think that it would be nice to have it a little easier in getting kids to "state" but to be honest that is for completely selfish reasons, I truly don't think it would mean that our kids have gotten better, just that they had an easier road to get there. The kids that work hard will still be the state qualifiers, they just will have a better chance to get there.

Judging by the message board, and the boos at the field house I have a feeling I am in the minority here, but does anyone else feel that the refs did a pretty solid job in the finals? I really did see any calls that were obviously wrong. It seemed like anytime anyone had a leg and went out of bounds the crowd was yelling for two and booing the call, every stalemate got a similar reaction from the crowd. I felt the refs were correct on almost all of the calls made or not made in the finals, I have definitely seen worse nights at the state finals than what we saw on Saturday. I think they did a hell of a job given how close and back and forth a lot of the matches were. Honestly what matches/ situations were there that were obviously wrong?

What were some of the trends that you noticed from this weekend? Here are three things that stood out to me- 1. Wrestling on a knee, or both knees- seemed like the light guys in the finals spent a majority of the match there. I found it interesting, seemed like every kid 106-132 spent some of the time there. Will this be a fad, or something that continues to grow in our sport? 2. Funk Rolls- I saw a ton of funk this weekend. It seems like this is something that has rapidly increased over the past few seasons, and something that as coaches we need to be working on if we want to get to the next level. I know i'll be searching youtube this summer for funk techniques. 3. Lack of leg riding- seems like leg riding was not as effective as it had been in the past. Thats not to say that it still wasn't around, but you don't see guys get rode out for entire periods due to legs at the finals very often anymore. Did any of the finalists use legs very effectively in the championship matches besides Kelley?

Shane Shroyer Churubusco is in for Baxter Northridge.