Youth programs serve as backbone for Central Catholic League wrestling teams
Reflecting on his early days in the sport, one of the top wrestlers in the CCL can't help but get nostalgic.
Hartley junior Cooper Rathburn, a two-time state tournament qualifier, fondly recalls the relationships and friendly rivalries he has developed over the years with his fellow competitors in the Central Catholic League.
It's a tale told often among CCL competitors, who form bonds at an early age through youth wrestling and carry them over to their high school careers.
“I grew up around the DeSales guys,” said Rathburn, who began wrestling at around 6 years old with a Reynoldsburg youth club. “A lot of them I wrestled in my first year at Reynoldsburg, so it’s all come full circle. We’ve all been in the CCL for a couple of years now. It’s funny to see the guys who I’ve known since we were all 3 feet tall and we’re all wrestling now trying to win state titles.”
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Along with training in Reynoldsburg, Rathburn previously worked with Team Miron Wrestling in Dublin and currently trains with CP Wrestling Club under DeSales coach Collin Palmer, who won four Division I state championships for Lakewood St. Edward from 2006-09.
Like most high school sports, wrestling success often begins at the youth level with strong feeder programs, and that is the case in the CCL with DeSales, Hartley and Watterson. Ready and St. Charles don’t currently have their own youth clubs; Ready is leaving the CCL after this school year to join the new Central Buckeye League.
Watterson’s youth club, the Little Eagles Wrestling Club, trains in Plain City under the leadership of former Ohio State standout Tommy Rowlands.
The club was founded in 2016, helping lead to the return of the sport to the high school level. It began with about 30 boys and has grown to 112 in kindergarten through eighth grade.
Watterson didn't have wrestling during the 2016-17 and 2017-18 seasons because of a lack of interest. Wrestling was brought back as a club sport in 2018-19 under coach Felix Catheline before regaining its school-sanctioned varsity status the following season.
“Coach Tommy Rowlands started the youth program with the help of coach Phil Anglim and a couple other really awesome families,” Catheline said. “We’re going to really start feeling the fruits of that next year. We have a really strong eighth-grade class and we’re going to get rolling from there. The future is bright.”
Rowlands said it was important to help wrestling return to Watterson, which has quickly become a force in central Ohio. Sophomore Mitchell Younger, who went 4-0 in the CCL duals Wednesday at DeSales, won the Division II state title at 144 pounds last season.
“I guess I started it, but we were all a big part of it,” Rowlands said. “We had kids that we wanted to experience the sport. There was no agenda other than our kids were already in this community and there is no wrestling, so we wanted to create a wrestling culture. There was no big vision at that time. It was ‘let’s start a wrestling club.’ ”
Rowlands credits Anglim and Shawn Conyers, along with many others, for their contributions in forming the club. Anglim won state titles for Watterson in 1976 and 1977 before wrestling at Ohio State, and Conyers also competed for the Buckeyes.
“It’s a community club,” Rowlands said. “Without dozens of examples of servant leadership from adults that are compelled to make a difference, this club does not have the energy or culture that it enjoys today.”
Rowlands, who has three sons and six nephews in the club, graduated in 1999 from Ready, where he won state championships as a junior and senior, and went on to become a four-time All-American and two-time NCAA heavyweight champion (2002, 2004) for Ohio State. He holds the Buckeyes' record for career wins (164) and was inducted into the Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2013.
Rowlands also was a six-time member of the U.S. National Team and an Olympic alternate in 2008 and 2012.
He considers his contributions to the youth club as giving back to the wrestling community.
“I didn’t recognize how fulfilling this would be, but it’s the most fulfilling thing I do in my life right now,” Rowlands said.
Along with CP Wrestling, DeSales features the Little Stallion Wrestling Club, which is led by Carlin Yetts and Justin Tackett.
“With the amount of club teams that are throughout the city and throughout the state, the development is definitely happening at a younger age,” said Palmer, who took over at DeSales in 2019 and guided senior David McClelland to last year's Division II state title at 132. “The better kids that are on the CCL teams, a lot of them come up through my club. It’s cool to see them all competing. The purpose of the club is to build up everybody. We don’t turn away anybody regardless of what high school you end up at.”
Ready sophomore Preston Tirey has trained at CP Wrestling since he was about 7 years old, building bonds with several fellow CCL wrestlers.
“We all grew up together,” Tirey said. “We talk a lot. I still go to DeSales and practice sometimes. When we’re in the room, we go at it. We’re all friends, but when we’re in the room we want to push each other and get as good as we can.”
@DispatchFrank
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus youth programs serve as backbone for CCL wrestling
