Westlake junior Jeff Green, senior Josh Kassil and senior Brad Jone all have their sights set on a trip to Columbus for the D-I state wrestling meet. (Photo by Larry Bennet)

Demons motivated to make statre tournament
By Zachary Dzurick
Sports
Published Feb. 22, 2006

Click here for an archive of West Life Sports Editor Zachary Dzurick's "Red Right 88" weekly columns.

Last year many expected Westlake to have two state qualifiers, which they did. Except the surprise to some ( but not those involved) was the two wrestlers were a underclassmen wrestling partners Josh Kassil and Jeff Green.

That taste of the state tournament has both motivated to make a return trip and their coach believes that senior Brad Jones has the potential to join them. This past weekend at Southview all three lost semi-finals matches to the St. Edward Eagles, the second ranked team in the country. All three bounced backed to win their third place match, thereby keeping them away from other district’s number one seeds. Westlake coach Mike Antonyzyn was not discouraged by the losses.

“If a loss has to happen, let it happen now,” Antonyzyn said. “We handled it well. Sure we have some work to do, but we just have to turn it up. They are ready and they feel good about themselves.”

Last year’s experiences have helped both Kassil now a senior and Green, who is a junior.

“Last year I was winning a match at states and I was thinking I couldn’t get turned and choose to go down. I got turned and couldn’t escape,” Kassil said. “I relied too much on being down and stalling. This year I worked on my conditioning because I did not want to go to overtime. I wasn’t conditioned enough and I stalled in the third period to get an easy win. But this year I turned it up to push the action and make the other kids feel like that.”

“I learned the competition is a notch higher and you have to go hard,” Green said. “Every second of the match is tougher than everywhere else.”

Another lesson was found when teammate Mo Salem did not advance to states after making it there junior year.

“It shows you that anything can happen in wrestling,” Kassil said. “Mo Salem went to states as a junior and you thought he would go again as a senior and he hurt his ankle. He didn’t catch a break. You are not guaranteed to go to states. So you tell yourself you have to work harder. Jeff and I work together which helps us go harder, longer and stronger. We both understand we have to push each other to never go easy.”

Doing that takes sacrifice.

“My goal is to be a state champ, but there is a lot of great competition out there,” Kassil said. “I want to erase everything else out of my life right now expect wrestling. I dream about it. I quit my job at Abercrombie. I want to focus on just wrestling and nothing else for the next three weeks.”

Antonyzyn believes the fact both have tasted state makes them even hungrier for a return trip.

“Once you go to the show, you want to go back,” Antonyzyn said. “It is my job to get those guys back there. Once you taste the state tournament, it is something you have in your sights.”

Jones wants to make a run of his own.

“Jones is a conference champ and he knows it is his senior year,” Antonyzyn said. “The last two weeks Brad has been on fire and is making the strides he has to make. He has been phenomenal.”

“It has been a goal of mine since I was a freshman,” Jones said. “I want to do the best I can do.”

Antonyzyn said Westlake alumni have returned to help the current kids get to states.

“We picked up some weight training and my first two state qualifiers Nathan Weir and Matt Gorski come back to the room and are helping a lot. They wrestle them two times a week,” he said.

It also helps to have a brain to go with that brawn.

“They are model students,” Antonyzyn said. “Two (Kassil and Jones) are in national honor society and the other has a 4.0 and can’t be in it yet because he is a junior. They are smart and have great work ethics. They do what they have to do. They are model student athletes. They are also the three hardest working kids I have coached in a long time.”

So is being in a sectional and district with the elite team in the state and several other outstanding wrestlers a positive or a negative?

“It is a necessary evil, you don’t want to wrestle the best kids until states,” Jones said. “But it is kind of good to wrestle them and maybe even take a loss against a tough wrestler to see what it is like.”

Kassil sees both pros and cons.

“You know what the bar is and you get a chance to feel them out a few times before it counts for real,” Kassil said. “But on the other side, you are getting beat up in these matches wrestling at your peak for six straight minutes. You feel those effects.”

Antonyzyn is looking forward to the district tournament at Mentor this weekend.

“We will hit the mats hard this week,” he said. “Then at districts, the four best in each weight class move on. We are taking a good group of kids and we will see what happens.”