Terrapin wrestling coach Kerry McCoy was expecting to be focused, preparing for an important match with No. 15 Virginia Tech yesterday morning.
Then the flakes starting falling Friday afternoon and put a damper on the whole weekend, cancelling a match that had already been moved back to accomodate the weather.
McCoy was at Comcast Center anyway. But instead of leading his team against the Hokies, he used his unexpected day off to watch Gary Williams and the Terps hoops squad thrash North Carolina just a few floors above the wrestling mats.
McCoy lamented the fact the Hokies, who lost to Lehigh on Friday, would have to drive through the snow coming from Bethlehem, Pa., rather than from their campus in Blacksburg, Va. And when asked whether he was secretly glad to be getting to watch basketball, he sounded legitimately disappointed his team wouldn’t get to wrestle this weekend.
Aside from the obvious conference bragging rights appeal, The NCAA Tournament is less than a month away and McCoy said the team could use the competition.
The Terps coach wouldn’t guarantee the match will get re-scheduled. The Terps have two more home matches, against American and Hofstra, and then end the season in Charlottesville on Feb. 20 against the Cavaliers…that’s what the schedule says at least.
McCoy said the team is unofficially looking at that last weekend as a potential reschedule date. The Terps will still host the match, and will look to wrestle the Hokies in College Park either the day before or the day after the Virginia match.
Although McCoy wanted to wrestle, given their frenetic and tournament-heavy schedule over the last month and the nagging injury issues that are hampering a number of starters, the team could use the rest.
McCoy said had the match taken place, both 125-pound starter James Knox and 174-pound starter Mike Letts would not have wrestled. In addition, 141-pound starter Alex Krom is still working his way back to full strength and 133-pound Steve Bell is still not 100% either but McCoy says he is pretty close.
McCoy described Knox’s inability to wrestle as “just general wear and tear from the crazy part of our schedule”, but Letts, who hasn’t wrestled since the National Duals in January, could be sidelined for sometime.
Letts is widely considered a serious contender to place for the Terps at the NCAA Tournament and is ranked No. 5 in the country. His replacement, Owen Smith, is just 1-6 in dual meets and 0-2 in the ACC.
Either way, the snow may have curtailed the Terps’ hopes to return the favor for last year’s loss, but in the long run it could be a good thing for the Terps’ hopes in March.