Wrestling Feature – DeWitt Driscoll
Practice is wrapping up deep in the bowels of Rec Hall. The Penn State wrestling team has just completed some conditioning drills and the Nittany Lions are straggling out of the wrestling room.
Coach Troy Sunderland sits on the bench near the doorway chatting with a few of his wrestlers who are riding exercise bikes when one of the other wrestlers stops to address him.
“Hey, coach,” DeWitt Driscoll says. “Did you put the schedule together so I could wrestle everyone in the Top 10?”
Sunderland just laughs.
Of course, Driscoll has a point.
So far this season, the junior from Connellsville has faced six wrestlers currently ranked in the Top 10: No. 2 Teyon Ware of Oklahoma, No. 3 Andy Simmons of Michigan State, No. 4 Cory Cooperman of Lehigh, No. 5 Ron Tarquinio of Pittsburgh, No. 6 Josh Churella of Michigan and No. 10 Frank Edgar of Clarion, twice.
And, before the season ends, Driscoll can look forward to bouts with No. 11 Alex Tsirtsis of Iowa, No. 13 Ryan Lang of Northwestern and No. 15 Mike Simpson of Indiana. He could also face No. 12 Tyler Laudon of Wisconsin in the 2005 Big Ten Championships.
Driscoll is looking up at all of them; he’s currently ranked No. 20.
He owns wins over two of them. He beat Cooperman, 9-5, and he toppled Edgar, 15-13.
Against the others, Driscoll showed flashes of excellence. But, inevitably, some sort of letdown or mistake allowed his higher-ranked foes to score the points necessary for a win.
“He’s just been inconsistent at times,” Sunderland said. “He wrestled a great match against Cooperman and has shown his ability to score on Teyon Ware and some other top kids. The kid from Pittsburgh (No. 5 Ron Tarquinio) has always given him tough goes. I think it was a weird situation at Mat Town that kind of got DeWitt off track a little bit losing that match.
“I definitely feel all those matches helped prepare DeWitt. He knows he’s capable of beating them. He knows he has the ability. He has to wrestle a smart match. He has to get off the bottom for several of them “most critically against Churella. I think that’s within his grasp. In DeWitt’s mind, he knows he can beat all of those guys. I think that’s a key going into the postseason.”
Driscoll first showed glimpses of his promise during the 2002-03 season. He compiled just a 6-2 record, but those six wins were notable. He stunned the field by capturing the 141-pound title at the Mat Town USA Invitational. He counted wins over eventual All-Americans Mike Maney of Lock Haven, who was ranked No. 3 at the time, and teammate Scott Moore.
With that as a building block, the 2003-04 season dawned with high hopes for Driscoll. But, an unusual malady derailed part of his season and, really, affected his whole year.
In the spring following his senior season in high school, he broke his arm. Then, in the fall of 2003, Driscoll started having problems with that same arm. After weeks of diagnosis and treatment, it was discovered that an infection had settled in the bone that had been previously broken. He had to undergo an operation to cut out the infection.
He faced an uphill climb to regain the form and conditioning he had enjoyed prior to the surgery, which left a six-inch scar on his left bicep. That really never came.
Driscoll went 18-17 on the season with six of those losses to Top 10 opponents. He went 1-3 at the Big Ten tournament, finishing eighth. But, that was one place away from a berth at the NCAA Championships.
This year, fully healthy and his unrivaled conditioning restored, Driscoll is trying again to add to the foundation he built during the last two seasons. He has put together a 22-11 record. More importantly, he is piecing together a book of knowledge against many of the wrestlers he is likely to face at Big Tens and NCAAs.
“It helps a lot,” Driscoll said. “Throughout the season I’ve been watching these guys. Cooperman is (fourth). The guys ahead of him and the guys right with him, like Tarquinio, I know I can beat these guys.
“Half of them I have beaten before. I know I’m as good as them. Nobody else knows it because I haven’t been able to prove it. I know I have it. I know I can be a national champion this year. This is one step toward getting my mind where I need to be to win it.”
Part of Driscoll’s success this year is learning to harness his intensity and aggressiveness. At a younger age, he was known for setting a frenetic pace early in matches and then having his energy wane during later, crucial stages.
“It’s been maturity taking over there. We’ve talked to him about his warmup and getting his adrenaline pumping and not getting that adrenaline rush too soon. Sometimes during a match he has a letdown,” Sunderland said. “We try to calm him down well before a match, when prior to this he would be expending a lot of energy, and make him hold that off until the beginning of the match.”
Sunderland said harnessing that energy and marrying it with his knowledge of the top-ranked wrestlers at his weight could yield the results the coaches and Driscoll are looking for.
“If he continues to stay healthy and avoid illness,” Sunderland said, “he’s going to get better and better.”
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