Once the exhausted wrestlers entered the JEB Stuart locker room, they took a deep breath. As managers and coaches filed in, everyone went wild! Their daily workouts had paid off. They won 4th place at conference, were sending 10 wrestlers to Regionals, sophomore Koshik Barua and senior Andrew Mason had won individual championships, and Coach Humphries had won coach of the year! The excitement was bouncing off the walls! Team mates were singing and banging the lockers. Wakefield wrestling had pushed and pushed and stayed strong though all of the grueling matches to win BIG at the conference championships at the beginning of this month.

Just one week later, freshman Steven Rochard, freshman Vincent Galang, sophomore Loranzo Rajaonarivel, sophmore Kowshik Barua, sophomore Jakub Glogowski, sophomore Simon Enkhbold, junior Daniel Donate-Perez,  senior Greg Velez, and senior Andrew Mason competed at Regionals in Orange, Virginia.  This is an amazing accomplishment considering the qualifiers include wrestlers from all grades 9-12.

This is all thanks to Coach Humphries who has coached for Wakefield wrestling for 23 years. Wrestling manager junior Ana-Sofia Uro-De Leon said, “he’s really funny, and reliable. He has a lot of stories and very motivational guy and gives good lessons. I couldn’t be happier for him; he really deserve the award because he has been with the most of these guys since freshman year and has always been there to help them push themselves.”

It was a tough season. Wrestling manager and junior Katelyn Ly  said, “we did really well this season, when we went against George Mason and Marshall…our team’s performance stood out.”

After the new year, the boys took the season even more seriously and put in even more work and it payed off. At Regionals everyone was in competition mode. Uro-De Leon said, “the biggest competition is themselves, they have to exceed their performance from last year and really push themselves.” The boys had a respectable showing in mid-February at Regionals. Four wrestlers moved on to States this weekend in Virginia Beach!

Kowshik Barua, Vincent Galang, Loranzo Rajaonarivel and Andrew Mason have made it to States. The most in recent memory. The quarter finals are today. The battles for 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th place are tomorrow.

We wish you well, wrestling warriors!