Growing Pains

With all young teams there comes a time when each wrestler has to make a choice. Is this really worth it? These choices are often referred to a growing pains. Moving out of our comfort zone often hurts, both physically and emotionally. But to get things you've never had you have to do things you've never done.

The Warriors were going through some of those in mid January. After losing a close match to North Gaston and finishing second in the Wildcat duals, the team traveled to Charlotte Catholic the next week and lost a close match and a chance at the conference title.

"It was my fault," said Coach Goins. "After the December peak, I failed to refocus the team on the most important thing, that we are family! We have to work to be the best wrestler we can be, but our relationships are the foundation to our success. We got focused on the mechanics, which are important, but tend to make us selfish and the tone on the team started to feel that way. Many of the wrestlers including veterans were checking out. After the Catholic match I made some adjustments to my attitude and in turn to the teams attitude."

It was a painful 2 weeks for the young team, but seems to have paid off, with a re-energized squad and leaders setting the example, the team finished the regular season with a 80-0 pounding of West Meck and 57-16 thrashing of Olympic in the last two home matches of the season.