GALION — The Galion Tigers wrestling team will take to the mats again this year under familiar leadership.
Head coach Brent Tyrrell is entering his 15th year as a coach in Galion and eighth season as the head coach. Matt Tyrrell is back again as an assistant and is joined by Matt Clum. A volunteer coach for the squad is Nick McDaniel, who was a state alternate for the Tigers last year as a senior.
Also departed from the team are Drake Barnett, who placed at state last season and Austin Reyes, who was a district qualifier for Tyrrell. A few other letterwinners also decided to step away from wrestling this season, leaving the group to pick up the slack of 127 total wins from a season ago.
“They are going to be hard to replace but we have some young men who up to the task,” states the head coach of the big time losses. Last year’s team finished 7-6 overall, 0-2 in the league and finished fifth overall in the Mid-Ohio Athletic Conference Red Division Tournament.
Returning for Galion will be a duo of multi-year letterwinners in seniors Garrett Kuns (three-time) and Cody Brader (two-time). Also back for the Tigers will be Tyler Goodrich and Mason Weldon and sophomores Brenden Ganshorn and Noah Grochowalski.
In addition, a few juniors and sophomores are trying out wrestling for the first time this winter. Carter Davis, Riley Evans, Ryan Jenkins, Gavin Pennington, Joah Singer and Titus Ivy will join the squad this year. Alongside them will be a strong group of freshmen in Chandler Lawhorn, Matthew Oehrli, Kyler Ratcliff, Cameron Osbourne and John Abouhassan.
“We have a good group of young men that have a good work ethic and will make growth from day to day,” says Tyrrell of his group of wrestlers. “We have some strong leadership with some post-season experience. Our coaching staff have some high expectations for this group,” he continued.
This season starts on Friday Dec.2 for the Tigers. They will travel to Pleasant for a tri-meet with the hosts and New Albany. The only home match scheduled for the team is set for Wednesday Feb.8 when they will lock up in a dual meet with the Bucyrus Redmen.
