ONE PROUD MAMA!!!!!

Well, Steven finally did it! After 6 hard years of wrestling, he FINALLY placed in the NJ Kids Wrestling State tournament. 7th Place - Junior 95 lbs! Only top 8 medal.

For the last 5 years he has qualified to wrestle at the kid's states - which is an awesome accomplishment in itself. There are 8 qualifiers and 24 bracket slots for each weight. Only the top 3 for each qualifier get to wrestle in the championship. So out of 192 wrestlers, 24 get to go to the states. Steven has always fallen into a weight class where he has a full bracket.

In past years at the States he's always lost his first two matches - we buy him the customary sweatshirt - and we get to go home early.

This year he really stepped up his wrestling. He started the season off great and then was side-tracked with a broken finger, that required surgery and pins and was out for 6 weeks. We didn't know what the end of the season would bring.

For the Renegades team, he took 1st Place at 90 lbs. in the end of the year tournament. Beating someone that has beat him in the past - wooohooo! For the Jr. Eagles team, Tri-County tournament he came in 3rd (could have been 2nd - but that's a whole other story). And took 1st in the qualifier.

The only expectation we had going into yesterday was to win at least one match. He was seeded 4th and had a first round bye. In his first match he pinned his opponent, but not before he had bloody nose. His second match went into overtime, he came around a little too late in the 3rd period and tied it 4-4 and lost 6-4 in OT (this wrestler took 2nd place - UGH!). He really got beat up in this match too. His third match he also lost 10-0, he was just so tired (I did forget to mention that he slept over someone's house the night before and this also included the "Spring Ahead"). And his fourth match was against someone he wrestles in the regular season and always wins against. He teched him in the second period (15-0). His fifth match was a piece of cake because the other wrestler left. That's okay - we'll take 7th! 8th would have been fine too!

Win or lose, place or not, I cannot tell you how proud of this young man his Dad and I are!

Congratulations Steve - you so deserve this!

Onto baseball!