ANDERSON, Ind. —
In the field for today’s Pendleton Heights Wrestling Regional are 21 wrestlers ranked in the top 20 in their respective weight classes by IndianaMat.com. Four of those are 21 are recognized as the No. 1-rated wrestler in their division by the state’s top website for high school wrestling.
There are 30 local competitors from Alexandria, Anderson, Elwood, Frankton, Lapel and Pendleton Heights each with hopes of moving on to the New Castle Semistate and beyond.
“Our regional has to be one of the toughest in the state because we have the potential for four or five state champions to come out of our regional,” AHS coach Carey House said. “That pretty much says it for what kind of competition you’re going to see.”
Among the competitors are six wrestlers who haven’t garnered state-wide recognition in terms of rankings, but their presence on the mat is no less of an impact for their program.
Those six wrestlers from Anderson High School — George Stokes, Zach Chism, Sean Warner, Dorian Wilson, Zach Williams and Mike Fetters — don’t have the accolades that others in the field have. What they are is a sign of progress for the Indians’ wrestling program.
“The wrestling program has really jumped in the past three years,” Chism said. “When coach House got over here, that’s when Anderson jumped. Nothing against the old coaches, but the coaching staff has made a difference.”
It’s believed that this is the biggest group of Anderson wrestlers to advance to the regional since the 2001 state tournament.
There was a time when wrestling at Anderson High was all but an endangered species. The low point in the program’s history came in the mid 2000s when there were only three wrestlers on the team one year.
Things weren’t that bad at the start of the 2011-12 season, but coach Carey House was worried about the numbers in the program and was setting his expectations accordingly.
“My expectations were to keep the numbers we had, have fun and give the guys a reason to keep coming back to the room ever day and try to have success,” House said. “I knew we’d be competitive. I thought we’d be around .500 this season, we finished 16-7 (in dual meets). We did really well in the tournaments we competed in. And we’ve been getting better every time we wrestle.”
“It made me feel pretty good to make him change his expectations,” Fetters said. “It let him know we could put more in than what he thought.”
“He didn’t have doubt in us,” Williams said. “It’s not necessarily proving a point against (his original expectations).”
“What athlete doesn’t want to go beyond his coach’s standards?” Wilson said. “When you go beyond the coach’s expectations you feel that much better and you want to go beyond them even more.”
Stokes and Chism — the team’s two senior captains — won individual titles at the Hamilton Heights Wrestling Sectional. Stokes — a semistate qualifier last season — was the champion at 152 pounds while Chism finished first at 182 pounds. Stokes has a record of 25-5 on the season. Chism is 29-7 for the Indians.
Warner (29-7) and Wilson (25-13) qualified at 220 and 170 pounds, respectively, in their first full varsity season as juniors. Williams (18-14) and Fetters (23-12) area a pair of freshmen that will be in the field at 120 and 113 pounds, respectively.
“We haven’t had this many kids going to regionals in a long time; either Anderson or Highland,” Warner said. “It shows us that that we have what it takes to be successful. We want to be on top. It’s been a long time since Anderson (wrestling) has been on top and we’re trying to send a message.”
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Anderson wrestlers Dorian Wilson, left, and Zach Chism practice on Wednesday as they prepare for Saturday's regional at Pendleton Heights. The Herald Bulletin
Discussion
Indians excel at exceeding expectations
Six AHS wrestlers among 30 locals in today’s regional
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