Driven attitude throughout team helps CCS wrestling improve

    Expecting a good group of incoming freshmen, Chase County wrestling coaches were pleasantly surprised by the size and attitude of their team this year.
    “We knew going into the season we were going to have a good group of young kids coming in but were even more surprised when we had double the amount of freshmen than we thought,” CCS Head Coach Matt Vlasin said.
    The group’s real driven attitude to get better and to win makes his job coaching them a lot easier, Vlasin added.
    The team was led by seniors Arturo Miscles, Cayden White, Cody Duffy and Brice Vitosh.
    Vlasin said after years of struggles to gain weight, Miscles was finally at a good weight and becoming a good wrestler.
    Then came an early season injury.
    “It would’ve been fun to see how his season ended if he could’ve stayed healthy,” Vlasin said.
    Miscles finished the year 4-1 at 113 lbs. after only three meets.
    Vlasin said White showed a lot of improvement over his career, from when he started really not knowing much of anything to making it to state his junior year.
     “His senior year started out great with having a lot of success. I know he wishes that it could’ve finished with another state qualification but we were glad to have him on the team,” Vlasin said.
    White was 24-15 on the year at 120 lbs.
    Vlasin said it’s going to be weird not having Duffy around next year.
    “He’s one of those kids that has enough heart for everybody on the team. He may not have always had the greatest success, but was always willing to work hard and always wanted to be the best,” Vlasin said.
    Duffy finished the season 21-25 at 152 lbs.
    After not wrestling much in youth wrestling, Vlasin said he was excited when team members talked Vitosh into joining the team as a freshman.
    “He made some huge improvements over the four years and even though his accolades may not always show it, he put an extreme amount of hard work and time in to try to make himself better. You always hope to have a team full of kids with a work ethic like that,” Vlasin added.
    Vitosh wrestled at 160 lbs. and was 27-22 this year.
    With eight freshmen and five sophomores on the team, Vlasin said the best part of this season was watching some of these young kids realize that they were good enough to compete.
    “When you can realize that at a young age, it’s going to make the next two to three years a lot easier on you,” Vlasin said.
    Sophomore Jaret Peterson had the team’s best record, 46-5, and placed third at 220 lbs. at state.
    Also finishing with winning records were freshmen Luis Co, 27-17 at 138 lbs.; Westyn Mendenhall, 33-20 at 132 lbs.; Thomas Reeves, 28-17 at 182 lbs.; and Zach Tarin, 28-19 at 195 lbs.
    “I’m always excited to see what the next season brings but the passion that this group of kids has is making me really excited for next year and the next couple years to come,” Vlasin said.