Nazareth’s Zach Horan won the prestigious Best of the East Wrestling Tournament at the University of Delaware over the weekend (read the Morning Call Article here).
Greg Noll was the other Nazareth to place, finishing in 6th place.
Of note, and not something I’ve read and would have expected to considering all the pre-season attention, neither Ryan Krecker, nor Franco Ferraina have competed on the mat for the Blue Eagles so far this season. It was announced that they would serve a suspension for an out of season incident during Cross Country, and having done so, I personally felt it would be hard for the wrestling staff to make a further suspension.
Whether the decision to sit-out is voluntary or otherwise, while difficult, it is the right thing to do (read about the incident and thoughts on the policy) and is in the spirit of the school’s first time offender policy. Missing the Nazareth Invitational and the Beast are equal to six PIAA competitions, out of 24 contested in a regular season.
At the point these two return, they will have paid a heavy price for making an off-season mistake. Let’s hope this not only makes a future positive impact on their lives, but also gives a bit more caution to younger wrestlers who look up to and emulate them so they are not in a like position themselves.
4 comments:
As an Easton wrestler who wrestled under Coach Crowell, I am not surprised that he has meted out his own suspension. He is a no nonsense coach who expects a lot from his wrestlers. Hopefully they have learned from this incident, and will make better choices moving forward. Everyone deserves a second chance. We have all made choices as kids that we would probably not make as adults. Lets give these two that same chance.
These kids certainly don't deserve the death penalty but, respectfully, I would suggest their offense was not a mistake. It was a conscious act and a choice, one that they knew full well was against the law but one they believed they could get away with.
A mistake is getting it wrong when you are trying to get it right. Calling this kind of thing a mistake is lowering the bar.
More important,
Congratulations to Zack Horan!
Clem, maybe I use the term a bit looser as in "lack of judgment", but my point was that the press was happy to write about how they tried to get around the policy, yet I hadn't seen anything about the fact that they are not competing.
It seems a further lesson was taught with their being out for these competitions. Some adults (I don't personally believe the kids came up with the plan) tried to get around the suspension for wrestling by participating in Cross Country, thereby lessening the punishment.
Had they got the ARD equivalent and been able to wrestle without serving a suspension during that season, I'd say they got off relatively easy.
The fact that someone stood up and said no, you will serve a suspension and miss events that mean a lot to you and your teammates, demonstrates that some adult had good sense and put what was right above winning.
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