high school wrestling

LEOMINSTER — What a difference a year makes.

The 2021-22 wrestling season at Leominster High School was one that lacked many highlights. As competitive as the Blue Devils were in the matches, they weren’t filling weight classes and forfeits piled up.

Recruiting was difficult. Even with a handful of talented grapplers onboard, getting enough athletes to join in was fighting a losing battle.

It was a tough sight for head coach Matt Schiller, then in his third season with the Blue Devils. though one had been lost to the COVID-19 pandemic. A former standout wrestler himself at Nashoba Regional, Schiller had hoped to build the program back to its glory years of the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Luckily, Schiller and his coaching staff are both skilled and patient.

That patience has paid off this season as the Blue Devils have put together a 19-4-2 record heading into the sectional tournament, with a roster unlike anything seen at Leominster High in quite some time.

“We knew we were going to improve from last year,” Schiller said prior to Monday’s practice. “We only had four wins and we lost something like six matches by less than six points, so we’d likely have a .500 record if we weren’t forfeiting 24 points every time we wrestled. You forfeit 24 points, you’re not winning many matches.

“We had 45 kids come out this year and knew we were getting a couple good, young freshmen and some kids that hadn’t wrestled, but we knew were tough. We had a bunch of football players come out. And just having the numbers and filling the weight classes, you’re able to get points and win matches.”

Having been on the mats in both high school and collegiately, Schiller admits wrestling can be a tough sell to athletes. It’s physical and demanding and success isn’t guaranteed, especially early on. Getting the team’s numbers up after years of decline was the first challenge the Blue Devils needed to address before even imagining any success.

“The coaching was good (over years here). but Leominster is kind of tough. There are a lot of good athletes, but it’s tough to get them to do stuff,” he said. “It’s a funny thing. I’d walk down the halls to try to recruit things and it was hard. The interest was always there, but it’s trying to motivate kids to come out and try something.

Everyone grows up playing basketball or football. In Massachusetts, no one grows up wrestling. So to try to convince a freshman who’s struggling with confidence to come out and get his butt handed to him for six week and maybe they’ll figure it out. .. That’s tough.

We’ve managed to do some recruiting and get things off the ground. Having so some success helps building interest.”

The Blue Devils have been able to find success without a senior-laden roster. There are just three seniors boosting Leominster on the mats this winter.

“We’ve got a few good seniors here, led by Isaiah Vega at 182. He’s been with me for all my time here,” Schiller said. “Tadeo Sena at 160 came out but hadn’t wrestled because of the COVID year and he’s 14-8 this season. John Escabi at 195 has been wrestling for two years, but he’s just a super tough kid.”

While the senior trio has certainly contributed to Leominster’s remarkable season, Schiller’s eyes widen when talking about the team’s future.

“We had 30 freshman and sophomores and we’re probably down to somewhere in the 20s now,” he said. “It stinks to lose the three senior starters that we have, but our numbers for the future are really good.

“Not only do we have every weight class filled, we have two or three kids at every weight class. So when we’re missing someone or want to move a kid, we have options. I don’t remember the last time Leominster had these kinds of numbers in wrestling.”

Among the reason to believe the future is bright for the Blue Devils is the wrestling of freshman twins Troy and Dan Greaney. Wachusett Regional students, the Greaney brothers have been just short of unstoppable this winter.

“We have a pair of super talented freshmen Greaney brothers from Wachusett. One is 30-3 and the other is 25-6,” Schiller said. “They’re just hard-nosed, old-school wrestlers. They make some freshman mistakes, but they never stop.”

While Schiller and his staff knew this season would be better than the last before things even kicked off, it took some time for other wrestling programs to notice. After strong showings in both the annual showcase tournaments in Milford and Chelmsford, Schiller says the respect level for his grapplers began to grow around the region.

“Just seeing the kids hang in there and place and have all these great performances against tough competition was amazing,” he said. “People started to keep an eye on us. And around Christmas, we had won a bunch of matches and you could tell people were starting to watch what we were doing.”

He points to a victory at Tyngsboro High, where the host Tigers had perennially used the Blue Devils as punching bags, as especially satisfying.

And with the wins rolling in, a buzz surrounding the resurgent program and a handful of talented underclassmen, Schiller no longer frets about drawing athletes into the program. Sure, some recruiting will need to be done to maintain the numbers next season, but the Blue Devils now have a trump card.

“Kids like to win,” Schiller said with a smile. “And we’re going to be able to sell them on a winning program.”