When the Terrapin wrestling team hosts North Carolina tomorrow, the Tar Heels will be out for revenge.
The Terps defeated the Tar Heels, 41-0, last season, winning all 10 matches en route to one of their most dominant victories in recent program history.
When the two teams meet again, coach Kerry McCoy expects a fiercer fight.
“Last year, we went down there and had a pretty good match, so this year they’re going to be pretty fired up for us,” McCoy said. “But we don’t want to lose ever, we don’t want to lose conference matches, and we don’t want to lose to North Carolina.”
“We blanked them last year, so they’re probably going to be fighting pretty hard,” ACC Co-Wrestler of the Week Corey Peltier said. “We just have to keep doing what we’re doing and wrestle well.”
After Sunday’s defeat against Virginia Tech, tomorrow’s match is all the more important for the Terps (10-4, 0-1 ACC). McCoy has stated all season that the ACC Championship is one of the team’s primary goals, and a 0-2 start to the conference schedule would damage the Terps’ chances.
“It’s a huge match, and it’s another opportunity for us to get better and prove that we’re doing the right things,” McCoy said. “We want to be the dual meet champs and win the conference tournament — it’s part of what we shoot for. We don’t want to lose to anyone, especially in our conference.”
The loss to the Hokies last weekend places the Terps in an uphill battle for the ACC’s top seed, but McCoy maintains that if the Terps want to find success against the Tar Heels and during the rest of the season, the team must train hard and focus only on what it can control.
“We need to continue to fight hard and battle,” McCoy said. “Everything is starting to come together as we start building toward that final peak, and we just need to really be focused on ourselves and keep doing what we do.”
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