Luke Stocky: Northwood Wrestling
Luke Stocky of Northwood High School has become one of the wrestlers to beat this year.
Photo by: Susan Shaffer | VIEW GALLERY
Luke Stocky is looking to upset the future title aspirations that many of his opponents in the 125 pound category have for the season.
Photo by: Susan Shaffer | VIEW GALLERY
"My personal commitment is to the team and something more than just individual performance."
Photo by: Susan Shaffer | VIEW GALLERY
SILVER SPRING, MD - In the world of wrestling you have those powerhouses that continually dominate the division year after year. In the case of Montgomery County Wrestling most people will think of Sherwood, Springbrook, Northwest or even Quince Orchard when comes to having established traditions of winning.
Yet, all of that changed last year when Luke Stocky of Northwood High School exploded on the scene when he quietly compiled a 30 -3 record. Then, he shocked the world with his stunning 4 -3 defeat of Michael Henning to win the County Championships last year.
With the Stocky commenting at the time, "Since we haven't had a county champion in like 25 years, it's pretty good. Northwood's not really there for wrestling but I'm representing."
Since that time the Northwood wrestling team has underwent a number of changes losing several key seniors to graduation.
However, one constant remains from last years team, Luke Stocky is looking to upset the future title aspirations that many of his opponents in the 125 pound category have for the season.
New Team, New Players
While this year seems like it could be one of rebuilding for Northwood, Stocky has become a component of their success this year. This is because throughout his high school career the overall quality of his wrestling has become even better.
What happened is the longer that Stocky wrestles with Northwood the better he is becoming. A good example of this can be seen by looking no further than his overall high school career where Stocky had a sold freshman year coming in with 19 wins and a fifth-place finish at the 2A-1A South Region.
Then last year he had only one loss going into the County meet, which was to Michael Henning. Once he was able to defeat him was when it became clear that Stocky was the future of Northwood wrestling.
With Coach Zea saying about Stocky's development, "He was very timid, and his conditioning wasn't very good, and he was a little sloppy.
He was just young and not really taking the sport as serious. We cleaned up his technique a lot and focused on his intensity and his attack, and on completely focusing on wrestling 24-7. He has taken to it really well."
Practice
To build off of his overall success last year Stocky has been working aggressively on improving his techniques and his strength training.
Part of the reason for this is he has become one of the wrestlers to beat this year. To become even better requires that he is prepared for anything that his different opponents will throw at him this season.
As result, Stocky is working on every different aspect of his wrestling game by having past players and former champions working with him on taking his overall levels of achievement even higher.
His primary focus recently has been working on those positions that are the very challenging in the sport.
Most notably the bottom position, for most wrestlers this is a very challenging position because you are at an obvious disadvantage during the match.
In the case of Stocky he believes that if he can master the most difficult positions, then he can become one of more dominant wrestlers around.
Never Quits
Like many of the most successful people in the world of sports Stocky never quits or gives up on his team mates instead he is dedicated to seeing everyone becoming better.
With him saying about the key losses from last years team, "Even though we lost some key players last year. I believe that if we follow the advice of Coach Zea and believe in each other we can be able to do very well this year. My personal commitment is to the team and something more than just individual performance."
As result, Stocky appears to be building off of his success from last season. If he can maintain his current discipline and focus, this will help him be able to realize his ultimate ambition of participating in Division I wrestling in college.
A few of the programs that he is interested in include: Lehigh and the University of Maryland. While no one knows what the future will bring, it would not be surprising to see Stocky advance to state and possibly to nationals this year if he continues at the current pace.
