Wrestling hits the mat for another title

Roger Peina continues to bring the Quakers further into the national spotlight. In the opening minutes of the new Adam Sandler movie, "The Waterboy," a college football analyst asks the University of Louisiana football coach if he would like to win yet another championship ring. In a strong bayou accent the coach replies, "Well, my daddy always said, 'The only thing better than a crawfish dinner is five crawfish dinners.'" Lately, Penn wrestling coach Roger Reina has had his own share of crawfish dinners, and every year they seem to be multi-course meals. Last season his team won both its fourth Ivy League title in five years and its third straight Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association (EIWA) championship, the latter by a record-breaking score (136.5 points) and margin of victory (18.5 points) over EIWA rival Lehigh. And as a little gumbo on the side, the Quakers finished the 1998 season ranked No. 13 in the nation -- their fourth consecutive increase in the poll since they broke into the national top 25 in 1995. But Reina is not licking his lips over the prospect of a few more meals in 1999 despite the fact that he will be seeing many familiar faces on the mat this year, including four of his five qualifiers for the 1998 NCAA Championships. Instead he is hungry to find more athletes like the 'Waterboy' on his squad -- wrestlers who harness the most of their abilities on a consistent basis. "It's clear we have a lot of individuals with a lot of ability," Reina said, "but it's about potential. I don't think there's anyone on our team yet that's realized their potential. If we perform to our potential then we should be competing with the top in the country." Penn, ranked No. 17 in the national pre-season polls, will soon have the chance to compete with some of the top teams in the country when it hosts the Keystone Classic Nov. 22 at the Palestra. The Quakers will host No. 11 Rider and No. 12 Arizona State along with four other teams in the tournament and will get their first taste of top-ranked competition this season. Penn should be up to the task of facing national competition so early in the season for the Classic. Six of Penn's 10 starters are ranked in the top 20 of their respective pre-season national polls and last year's recruiting class -- Penn's highest-ranked ever -- is now a group of experienced sophomores that includes Ivy League Rookie of the Year Rick Springman. "In looking at this season in respect to past history, we've gained a lot of experience over the past year," Reina said. "Everyone's entering this year's competition with more confidence, more experience under their belts and more of an idea of what is needed to compete. This team is ahead of where last year's team was at this point in the season." Later this season the Quakers will face more top-ranked teams when they travel to No. 7 Central Michigan and No. 13 Lehigh for dual meets. Penn will also compete in multiple tournaments featuring national powerhouses, including No. 4 Penn State, throughout the winter. Penn's trio of captains, including seniors Mark Piotrowsky and Andrei Rodzianko and junior Brett Matter, are also confident in the ability of their team to wrestle with the best programs in the nation. "Our team's getting stronger every year," Piotrowsky said. "They now know what they're headed into and how hard they need to train to get there. I think we're in good shape." But both the coach and captains also realize that continual improvements need to be made for everyone on the team to find the full potential that he is searching for. Reina said that every match will be a benchmark for the next and that constant evaluations will be made so every wrestler can "build upon their own arsenal." Matter said that once he and his teammates are on the mat, though, they need to think only about the present match. "[We need to] be focused on the task at hand and take care of business when it's time, and if we do that then everything else will fall into place," he said. Things have been falling into place well for Matter and his fellow upperclassmen, who have helped lay the foundation for a strong winning tradition at Penn. Over the past five years the Quakers are 24-1 in the Ivy League and 29-2 in the EIWA and their improving national ranking shows that Penn is receiving recognition for this impressive recent record. "Each year it keeps getting better and better," Matter said. "I believe now when we walk around [during the NCAA Championships] people know the University of Pennsylvania and that we belong here." To show that the Quakers truly do belong among the best, Piotrowsky wants the team to finish the season as one of the top 10 teams in the nation and to qualify as many Penn wrestlers to All-American teams as possible. "There's only one way to go, and that's forward," he said. With the potential that Reina sees in this team and the experience it has already gained over the past season, Penn should have enough momentum built up to begin this next move forward. And once it is all through, maybe Reina will be able to enjoy yet another fine crawfish dinner with a side of top-10 gumbo.