Brianna Billard
The Voice
Everett HS
1st Place
Division 2, News Writing
Sports Feature Story
The building is cold and the lights are bright. As the wrestlers begin their matches, you can smell their sweat, and hear the squeak of their shoes. It’s sophomore year, and Christopher Tidwell prepares for his first match of the day. When his eyes meet his first opponent, he’s instantly intimidated. Jacob Stewart is wrestling at 140 pounds, but he looks nearly 160. Although Tidwell was nervous for his first tournament, his teammates cheered him on throughout the match and talked him through his first loss.
“He beat me real bad,” said Tidwell.
For the past few years, the wrestling team has always been there for one another, and a close knit family with nearly 40 members. However, there aren’t as many wrestlers for the 2014-2015 season.
“I was really looking forward to wrestling with all of my teammates,” said Tidwell. “Now that we don’t have a lot of wrestlers, we automatically lose matches.”
Senior football player and ex wrestler James Fredd said that he enjoys football more than wrestling, and was just looking to participate in a winter sport to keep in shape.
“You physically have to be more in shape to do wrestling. After the first thirty seconds, you’re exhausted but you have to keep going,” said Fredd.
Due to the lack of wrestlers, they don’t win as many meets as they did in the past.
“If we don’t have a full line up then we have to give the other team six points for each weight that we don’t have somebody,” said wrestling head coach Chad Foster.
Mat maid Antonella Benavides says that sometimes it’s hard for the boys to focus and they don’t do as well, which makes them want to stop wrestling.
“I think it’s hard for them to stop thinking so much about what they should and shouldn’t do during a match,” said Benavides.
Sometimes the boys feel pressured to please their coaches, parents, school, etc like most athletes do. However, even when the wrestlers do their best, they can’t always pull through.
“It’s frustrating [when an athlete doesn’t do well] because you know that they’ve been working hard and putting in a lot of time, and it sucks because the results aren’t coming. It’s tough to keep their mental aspect of wrestling up,” said Foster.
When losses happen, the coaches make sure to build the players back up and try to have them make corrections in a positive way.
“When they don’t do well, you try to focus on the good things that they did, instead of tearing them down,”
For the 2013-2014 wrestling season, they had nearly 20 more wrestlers than they have this year.
“The main reason that there’s not as many wrestlers is that there’s not as many new kids. There’s only about five this year when there were almost 15 last year,” said Foster. “Kids are just getting lazier and wrestling is super tough.”
Having many seniors on the team is helpful because they usually have more experience. However, having freshmen on the team is great in the long run.
“Seniors mean that hopefully they’ve been aggressive for a while, I don’t mind young kids who are fresh to the sport, you can teach them what you want them to know,” said Foster.
He includes that wrestling is a difficult sport that you have to be in shape for, and dedicated to in order to improve.
“You have to be strong minded, you have to be able to deal with different bruises and injuries, you have to be mentally strong,” said Foster. “You have to be able to tell yourself that you’re not tired. A lot of kids like to be lazy, but wrestling is a sport that you can’t be lazy in.”
By being mentally strong, players can’t let the little things get to them, they have to trust in themselves and let their body do the work.
“We tell a lot of our kids to stop thinking. When you’re thinking your mind is telling you one thing but your body is telling you that you can do more,” said Foster.
Like any sport, every athlete is different. Humans learn things differently and perceive things in different ways than their teammates might.
“Good coaches don’t treat everyone the same, because they have different circumstances, and different personalities,” said Foster.
Although a few of the athletes couldn’t manage wrestling this year, many wrestlers still have a strong passion for the sport.
“I love learning new moves, it makes you understand how the human body works,” said Tidwell.
Even though the team has been through struggles this season, the wrestlers have done well individually.
“When an athlete does better than expected it shows that they’ve been working hard and it’s paying off,” said Foster. “Maybe they are getting better every day like you expect as a coach. It’s rewarding to know that it’s paying off.”