The Marist Wrestling team started their season on Friday, November 17 with their Red and White night. The team’s first match is November 30 against Loyola. Marist has great expectations for this season.
Marist is considered one of the best wrestling teams in Illinois. They have many wrestlers who are ranked highly. According to Exposure Illinois, they are ranked third in the 3A division and 36th nationally and behind only St. Charles East, Mount Carmel, and Joliet Catholic in the Illinois rankings.
Individually, Marist has seven returning state qualifiers. All of them are ranked in their weight classes: Tommy Fidler 4th at 113, George Marinopoulos 12th at 120, Michael Esteban 2nd at 126, Donovan Allen 4th at 132, Will Denny 1st at 150, Ricky Erickson 4th at 175, Connor Phelan 6th at 190. Two of the wrestlers placed at last year’s state tournament. Denny took 4th place and Phelan took 3rd.
“Obviously we want to win team-state, and we have worked very hard for our goal,” said Fidler.
Marist did very well individually but didn’t qualify for team state last year.
They have been working hard in their offseason training. They have been practicing nearly everyday for a couple hours.
“My expectations for this year individually are to place at state. Qualifying for state was great but now I want to go a step further and place,” said Fidler. Those high aspirations hold true for the rest of the team as well.
