Ricky Shook Quotations

We're just striving to get guys through this week. I'm hoping to get between four and eight guys through. If we get eight, that would be great. If we get four, it's going to be a struggle. We usually end up right in the middle of what I think, so we'll probably get five or six.

Franklin High is here and Amity added some tough kids. Look at New Milford. They were second last year and they're fourth this year. Fourth with a good team that is top 10 in the state. We added some tough teams to the tournament this year.

We had a really good tournament and we had guys wrestle hard. New Milford also had a great tournament. This says a lot for wrestling in our two little towns.

You have a kid that's wrestling a real good guy, you tell him hopefully you can win this match, but if you can't, you have to wrestle back hard, not only for yourself to extend your season, but for the team. From day one they see the banners in the gym and they understand. I tell them it's not always about you - it's about everybody on the team. We are a team. Somehow I seem to get everybody to buy into that.

It was a little harder this year. This is 18 out of 19, but we had some tough competition.

The State Open, the way it's bracketed, you just never know where you're going to end up. If you have three good guys that go to the finals you're going to score a lot of points. Some teams this year have that available to them, teams like Windham or Ledyard or even a team like Griswold probably.

Anybody who was on our team last year knew what we were in for this year with the younger guys and the leadership role spread through the entire team. Our captains, everybody just watches them and knows what to expect.

They knew that part of our goal was to have 11-12. After this week it is seven to nine for New England's. If we have only four or five it won't help too much. The last two weeks we have talked a lot as a team about goals. This tournament was one of them.

It's on everyone's mind. It's not really looking ahead. We take one tournament at a time, but each tournament extends your season.

If you have a three or four guys go deep, you can win the State Open. You've got to get everybody to wrestle well and get your team points. That's what we're going to try to do.

He wrestled kids from Virginia, Ohio, Minnesota and New Jersey. It was unbelievable. We never had anyone place before. It's pretty special.

A lot depends on the draw, but he was beating kids he had no business beating. He had a great tournament and even surprised himself.