Former Parkview star Hage follows father as wrestling coach

By Will Hammock
Staff Writer
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Wrestling Coach His roots are in teaching, although Scott Hage didn’t immediately follow that path.

The former Parkview standout – well known as the first Georgia wrestler to win four Class AAAA high school state titles, from 1988 to 1991 – graduated from West Virginia with an English degree and earned his master’s degree in public administration. He worked for three years at the National White Collar Crime Center in Morgantown, W.Va., but wasn’t completely content.

That’s when something, family ties topping the list, led him back to teaching. The son of Brian Hage, a legendary high school coach who was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame, he followed his father’s path into
coaching.

“I guess teaching is in my blood, “said Hage, the head wrestling coach at Bridgeport High School (W.Va.) the past three seasons. “My parents are teachers. My wife’s a teacher. I fought it as long as I could.”

So Hage went through the certification process to become a teacher, completing his first school year last month as a seventh-grade English teacher at Washington-Irving Middle School in Clarksburg, W.Va. The three-time NCAA qualifier at West Virginia coached the Bridgeport program for the past three years, but he stepped down after successfully building up a team that had been defunct for 20 years.

The 32-year-old is deciding on a new wrestling job and looking at two openings closer to his Fairmont, W.Va., home. It was more than a 30-minute drive to Bridgeport for practices and matches.

Hage definitely plans to coach wrestling in the future, which doesn’t surprise Parkview coach Dennis Stromie. Stromie, a good friend of the Hages and former assistant to Brian Hage, coached the eldest Hage brother to his four state titles.

“(Hage’s) a good coach because he’s so patient, “Stromie said. “He’s very low key. Sometimes during his junior and senior years, I’d have to get him to be more vocal. He’s a quiet guy. But he’s learned the basics at every level. He’s been around great programs. And his dad being who he is, he’s learned a lot from him. You’re not going to find anyone who knows more wrestling than him, and he’s great at dealing with the kids.”

Stromie and others close to Hage also are equally proud of the former star wrestler’s work outside of the school system.

He enlisted with the U.S. Army Reserve in February 2001, seven months before terrorist attacks rocked the nation. Reservists around the country have been called up regularly since Sept. 11 and Hage is no different, serving two deployments since signing up for duty.

A sergeant with the Grafton, W.Va.-based 363rd Military Police unit, his first mission was homeland security, specifically guarding an ammunition plant in Virginia. His second deployment, from February 2003 to January 2004 was far more dangerous.

Hage spent that 11-month period in Kuwait and Iraq with tasks like customs duty, convoy escort and assorted other missions. His unit also was responsible for highway patrols, keeping watch over an area that was roughly 50 miles long.

He leaves later this year for training in Egypt and is pretty certain he will be deployed again because he has three years of service left on his contract. He just isn’t sure when to expect the next call.

“The mind-set is that it’s just a matter of time before we’re deployed again, “said Hage, who has been married to his wife Donna for nine years. “That’s fine with me. It’s something I signed up for. It irritates me when people sign up (for duty) and then complain when they get called up. It’s almost like people aren’t proud of the country anymore.

“You give your word, you sign the contract and you serve your country for the next six years.”

Stromie admits it’s “scary “to think about one of his former wrestlers in harm’s way, particularly one he’s known for so long. The Parkview coach was an assistant to Brian Hage and the legendary coach, who was in transition between coaching positions, wanted a good high school coach for his oldest son.

So Brian Hage entrusted Stromie with his son, which was quite a gift. Hage went on to score the rare feat of four state wrestling titles, making him the most decorated wrestler of the outstanding group of champions in Parkview history.
Stromie still remembers when Hage couldn’t crack Parkview’s starting lineup as a freshman until after Christmas. The ninth-grader reached the state finals but trailed LaGrange senior Rodney Thornton 6-4 in the final 15 seconds of the match.

Thornton was on top when Hage suddenly reversed the LaGrange wrestler, a four-time state runner-up, and put him on his back to set up a surreal finish. He cradled Thornton and eventually pinned him for the first of his four state titles, this one at 145 pounds.

“It seemed like the last few seconds of the match, but I couldn’t hear anything, “Hage said. “I thought I heard somebody slap the mat (for a pin). If you watch the tape, you see me look back. I was going on an impression of what I thought happened. I didn’t see (the referee) slap the mat.”

The sequence of events unfolded so fast that a post-match photo of Hage and Stromie shows the scoreboard at 6-6 with three or four seconds left on the clock. Officials didn’t have time to put the near-fall points awarded to Hage on the scoreboard.

It was one of the most thrilling finishes to a state match that Stromie can recall in his long career.

“It was so dramatic, “Stromie said. “For a freshman who didn’t even make your lineup until midway through the season to win like that over a senior, oh my gosh. That’s when you knew (Hage) was something special. It was so exciting.

“The whole place just went berserk. You had to see it to believe it, to see how emotional and dramatic it was.”

From the final match of his freshman season, Hage was rarely tested again in high school wrestling. The Thornton match was easily the closest he came to losing in the state tournament. He dominated the next three seasons with three more state titles, one at 145, one at 160 and the last at 171.

Hage then earned a scarce full wrestling scholarship, particularly for a Georgia wrestler, to a top-20 program – West Virginia. He reached the NCAAs three times, but his sophomore and junior seasons were greatly affected when he blew out both of his knees.

A Mountaineer team captain as a senior, Hage is known more in Georgia for his whopping high school accomplishments, which doesn’t bother him. His Parkview days are filled with great memories.

“It was a blast, “Hage said. “As a teacher I see how nice it is to be comfortable with who you work with. I worked with a great group at Parkview in wrestling. My father’s best friend (Stromie) was coaching me during the school year and my father was coaching me in freestyle. It was the best of both worlds.”

– Name: Scott Hage
– Position: Wrestling coach, most recently at Bridgeport High School (W.Va.); teaches seventh-grade English at Washington-Irving Middle School in Clarksburg, W.Va.; active member of U.S. Army Reserve
– Age: 32
– Education: Graduated from Parkview High School in 1991; graduated from University of West Virginia in 1996 with an English degree; earned master’s degree in public administration from West Virginia in 1998
– Background: First Georgia wrestler to win four high school state titles in Class AAAA, taking first from 1988 to 1991; three-time NCAA qualifier at West Virginia and team captain in 1996; college career hampered by injuries to both knees; son of legendary Georgia wrestling coach Brian Hage; has been head coach at Bridgeport High School the past three years; started Bridgeport wrestling program again after a 20-year hiatus; deployed twice with the Army Reserve, one in the U.S. and one to Iraq and Kuwait
– Family: Wife, Donna