Among other winter sports, the AMHS Wrestling team has fought their way through a successful season. Starting in September, these raptors have been putting in the work on the mats. Since basketball gets priority over the gym courts, the wrestling team holds their daily practices in the school cafeteria. Despite this concession, they are usually able to use the gym for weekend matches and competitions. Wrestling matches are unique to other sports in that multiple schools show up to a single event. Two teams wrestle through all of the weight classes before facing off against another school. . A match can be won either by pinning the other wrestler– keeping them on their back/ shoulder blades for one second– or by an accumulative point system. While tournaments will last for several hours, a single match is typically about 3-6 minutes long, only longer if an overtime occurs due to neither opponent being pinned or a tie in points.
Led by Coach Hagy and Assistant Coach Lovering, the team consists of seniors John Napolitano, Luke Napolitano, Cy Benich, Nick Severance, Daniel Harris, Daniel Kagan, Max Peters, Brian Fang and Nelli Sundara. The rest of the team consists of juniors Xavier Nutting, Yamil Perez, and Lincoln Boucher, sophomores Trig Northrup, Nicholas Turco, Sidanth Omraju, Peter Marckov, Manny Salazar, Dean Barnwell, Reece Szymkowicz, Caden Sullivan, Andrew Wolfheil, freshman Briggs Holcombe and Max Hansen and last but not least, 8th grader Ronan Fox. Most of the team consists of students from Magnet except for Nelli, Nick, Ronan, Dean and Daniel Harris who go to SOA. Recently at the individuals King of the County tournament, seniors Nick Severance and Daniel Harris placed third and senior Cy Benich placed second in their respective weight classes.
Just like many other sports, the wrestling team has unique traditions of their own, including reciting “Man in the Arena,” a speech first delivered by Theodore Roosevelt in 1910, after every practice. On what the significance of this powerful oration means, Cy Benich says this tradition “reflects the individuality of wrestling in that it is all on you.” The players find this speech to be an inspirational reminder that although they may lose, trial and error is better than not trying at all. Wrestling is certainly a tough sport to participate in and requires not only strength but serious discipline. From waking up at the crack of dawn and hitting the gym to skipping meals in order to make weight, this is not a sport for the weak. In order to have a better chance against the competition, most wrestlers will fast for sometimes even a few days in a row in order to lose enough weight to drop a weight class. This typically results in very low energy due to a lack of food. Wrestlers are “weighed in” an hour or so before their actual matches, after which they are finally able to eat and regain their strength. This difficult aspect of wrestling has led to yet another tradition for the AMHS wrestlers, which is to eat a snack of potato bread, banana, peanut butter, and honey right before their matches to break fast. This high-protein combination ensures these competitors can be fueled and ready to go for their upcoming match.
