First-year wrestlers make
impact on Canton's program

BY CHARLES ROTHWELL
Dec. 24, 2009, 4:30 p.m.

  Richard DeMarois was in fourth grade when a friend showed him a pamphlet about the Canton Wrestling Club. Wrestling  sounded fun, so he gave it a shot. Five years and multiple MYWA tournament championships later, DeMarois is a freshman 103-pounder starting  for the No. 9-ranked team in Division 1.

  His goals are to win at least 30 matches this year and to be a multiple all-state wrestler by the time he graduates. Richard would love to wrestle in college and want to become a lawyer.

  Keshav Patel is a dedicated student who wants to go to medical school. He also wants to be a well-rounded student, so he decided to go out for the freshman football team.

  It didn't take long for him to realize that football isn't a good sport for a 100-pound athlete, and being a vegetarian does not lend itself  well to "bulking up." Patel's football buddies  who also wrestled educated him on the need for light weights on the wrestling team. One year after going out for the team, Keshav has progressed to where he has started at 112 pounds. His goal is to qualify for the individual state tournament at 103 pounds this year, and to place at the state meet  by the time he graduates.

  Although Marc Przbylski has an older brother and cousins who wrestled, they played no part in Marc's choice. It was the Central Middle School gym teacher, Mark Lapointe, who introduced the seventh-grader to wrestling.

  He immediately fell in love with the sport, started coming to Canton's open room, and then joined the Canton Wrestling Club to get more mat time.

  His goals for his freshman year are to make the varsity line-up at 112 or 119 pounds. Marc wants to be an all-state wrestler by the time he graduates and though he has no plans to wrestle in college, he thinks it would be fun to come back to the room and help coach the junior varsity team.

  What else is an eighth-grader in Iowa going to do for a winter sport: basketball? "No way," according to Alex Eimers. But his training in Iowa was very brief, as the family soon moved to Michigan.

  One day in class, a student teacher named Cory Mancuso found out where Alex was from and told him, "You are going to be a wrestler." Now a sophomore, "Iowa" has started some matches at 119 pounds. He hopes to steadily improve and win as many matches as possible this year and eventually become a state champ. Alex does not plan to wrestle after high school.

  Sophomore Sean O'Keefe was heavily influenced by his father and uncles who all wrestled. They explained to him how wrestling makes you mentally and physically tougher and Sean certainly wanted to become stronger.

  So as an eighth-grader, Sean joined the Central Middle School wrestling team. As a freshman, Sean saw a few varsity matches, but this year he is the starter at 145/152 pounds. His goals are to be a regional qualifier this year and eventually a state champ. O'Keefe wants to wrestle in college because he plans on becoming a police officer and thinks it's important to maintain his strength and conditioning.