Coming off an injury-riddled regular season, capped with a loss on his own Senior Night, Terrapins 133-pound wrestler Geoffrey Alexander viewed the NCAA Tournament as a chance to end his final season the way he wanted.
But after entering the championships as a seeded wrestler for the first time in four trips, Alexander couldn’t capitalize on the opportunity. After defeating Austin Eicher of Northern Illinois in his first match, Alexander dropped his next two bouts, marking the end of his five-year career.
While Alexander could’ve capped a tough Terps season on a high note, the team’s lone wrestler to make it to New York failed to generate much success. The Terps finished the season with a 5-13 record and just one Big Ten win.
“It’s definitely disappointing, just not how you want to end the season,” coach Kerry McCoy said. “It was a tough year in ways and, I hope we can learn from it going into next year.”
Coming off a season during which they went winless in their new conference, the Terps entered 2015-16 looking to take steps forward. The team notched its first-ever conference victory Jan. 10 over Michigan State but only won one more match all season — a 31-9 win over George Mason.
The disappointing season culminated with a 26-12 loss to Rider on Senior Day, marking the end of many of the veterans’ careers.
“It’s definitely not what we wanted to happen,” 125-pound Michael Beck said after the loss. “It would’ve been a lot nicer to get the win for them and finish it up right.”
In their first two years in the Big Ten, the Terps are 1-17 in conference matches. It hasn’t been just the team struggling, though. The wrestlers haven’t been as successful individually as in years past, with no All-Americans since the transition and only three NCAA qualifiers — Alexander, 157-pound Lou Mascola and former 285-pound Spencer Myers.
The Terps’ struggles have even been exacerbated in postseason play.
Last season, the Terps finished the conference tournament with 10.5 points and tied for 39th place in the NCAA Tournament with six points. This season, the Terps took a step backward, finishing last place in the Big Ten Tournament with 7.5 points and placing 64th at the NCAA Tournament with only one point.
Watching the trend in the wrong direction hasn’t been easy for Alexander. After winning four Western Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic League titles, Alexander entered as a highly touted recruit gunning to uphold the Terps’ dominance in the ACC. But once the Terps moved to the Big Ten, they plummeted to the bottom of the conference standings.
“It’s tough to see what’s happened,” Alexander said. “I came into a powerhouse team in the ACC and then we ended up in a powerhouse conference.”
But McCoy thinks the issues extend beyond the conference switch. He questioned the team’s passion and commitment.
“What you put into it is what you’re going to get out of it,” McCoy said. “If you try to cut corners or weasel through this, it’s not going to work out as well as if you’re 100 percent all in.”
Part of that commitment is managing weight, something McCoy says 141-pound Alfred Bannister struggled with all season. Bannister, a team captain as a redshirt freshman, entered the season expected to lead the Terps after winning 30 matches on the open circuit. Instead, he went 10-10.
While McCoy has hope for the future and growth of the team’s underclassmen, such as Bannister, this season was a reminder of how far the Terps are from contending in the Big Ten.
“The bottom line is that we have to get the guys to continue to work hard and to believe in it all,” McCoy said. “It’s not a secret that the guys who are successful are the guys that do it at a high level all the time. You don’t take six weeks off at any point during your career if you’re trying to be elite; you take that time when you’re done.”
