Homewood-Flossmoor boys wrestling may be ready to take things up a notch.
The roster at the start of this season is 90 wrestlers deep, including a slew of freshmen, Coach Jim Sokoloski said. Wrestling rooms aren’t the biggest ones in the school, so it’s a tight fit. But that’s a good problem to have.
“We want more people in the program. Every sport has attrition but wrestling has probably more attrition than anything else,” Sokoloski said. “I’d like it to be about 60 and that’ll probably happen in time.”
That’s no accident. The youth club feeder system is healthy. The culture is established and easy to see. The wrestling community that Sokoloski and his staff have been trying to build is taking shape. In Sokoloski’s five seasons, he’s had 11 all-state wrestlers.
H-F graduate Vincent Robinson’s NCAA championship at North Carolina State last winter was a boost for the program’s reputation, too.
“This is year six and every year you can see it’s getting tipped that way a little more,” he said. “It doesn’t hurt to have a Division I national champ poster in your room. That helps.”
The high school squad looks good, too. On team picture day Nov. 19, the Vikings were decked out in red and grey Nike Tech sweatsuits with H-F logos. That’s all part of the plan and may be one of the reasons the roster is so deep.
“A big thing I learned from (former H-F football coach Craig Buzea) is that the kids have got to look good. They’re your best recruiters,” Sokolosi said. “Kids see that and want to be a part of it. Winning helps.”
The seniors think this group may do a lot of winning.
“I think this team is better than what it was a year ago. We’ve got a lot of good guys, a lot of good energy in the room,” Henry Grant said. “It’s just a good atmosphere, a lot of hard work.”
The schedule, as usual with H-F wrestling, is a demanding one. The Vikings will head to Walsh Jesuit Ironman in Ohio and the Powerade tournament in Pennsylvania, in addition to a slew of challenging local and regional events.
The aim of that kind of slate is to make the postseason series less daunting, Sokoloski said. It’s also good exposure for the kids.
“No offense to any tournaments around here, but the best kids in the country wrestle in Pennsylvania, Ohio, etc.,” Sokoloski said. “If you wrestle a kid there who’s supposed to be really good and you compete or beat them, now those (college coaches) know who you are. You just don’t get that anywhere else.”
The lower weights are still a work in progress but the middle and heavy weights should be as good as any group Sokoloski has had, he said.
Chazz Robinson, Roan Dukes and Ethan Hamilton are the returners with the most past success. Hamilton is the only returning state qualifier but Dukes has lofty aims.
“My goal is to have a 30-plus win season, be conference champ and place at state,” he said. “It’s going to be fun this year.”
Xavier Pratt and Ryan Koprowski are still working their way back from football injuries but should help.
“From 120 up, we’re going to be tough as nails,” Sokoloski said. “The first part of the year will probably be rough in dual meets. Luckily we don’t have that many. But I’d say by January, from 120 up we’ll be as tough as you’re going to see.”
Idris Akeeb is ready to lockdown the heavyweight division. He said his lifting has made him “wrestling strong,” with more explosive movements and endurance.
“The weight room really matters, especially at higher weight classes,” he said. “When I’m wrestling now, my partners, they’re like ‘You hitting me, man.’”
The plan is to continue getting better and eventually peak in the postseason.
“I would not want to wrestle against our guys in February,” Sokoloski said. “We’re going to put them through the gauntlet and by that time it’ll be like ‘Oh, this is sectionals, let me go beat this kid. Oh, it’s state, let me go beat this kid.’ We plan it that way.”
