Following cooperate agreement with Wayne High, the Laurel-Concord-Coleridge girls and boys wrestling program is making a return to LCC.
Chad Koch will bring seven years of wrestling coaching expierence and will be in his first year as the head coach in the high school level. He also has coached football for three years.
"We are excited to give our kids an opportunity to wrestle in our school," said Koch. "The youth and Junior High program has had a lot of success over the years and these wrestlers have been anxiously awaiting to represent the LCC community. The alumni wrestling family that came before I know is excited to have a team back here in the school."
Joining coach Koch as assistants will be Melissa Graham, Travis Wright and Colin Hough.
The LCC girls team will be made up of five while 10 boys are out for the Bears with one senior on each side. They include Darly Garcia for the girls and Aiden Heydon for boys.
During the offseason, LCC wrestlers worked on their strength and conditioning.
"First week of practice is getting back into wrestling shape," said Koch. "Most importantly with our youthful group is hammering out the technique. The group has a lot of learning to do, but they are catching on fast."
With this season being new for 2025-26, wrestlers at Laurel-Concord-Coleridge showed interest late. LCC girls and boys wrestling will be coming together as a group day by day.
Team goals were still being set by the coaches at the time of this preview while additional details were not available on top returners with LCC being a co-op within the Wayne program the past couple of years.
LCC will compete on the road in every event this season starting with the Creighton Invite for both the girls and boys on Dec. 6.
Senior Darly Garcia-Perez will represent the LCC girls in the 155 lb division as sophomore Weston Patefield will compete in the 144 weight class for the boys.
Garcia-Perez and Patefield didn't get on the mat until seventh grade.
The two LCC wrestlers highlighted their first week take-aways and what they're mosted excited about.
"New skills," said Garcia-Perez. "I am most excited to be back on the mat wrestling again after an injury."
"Is getting back in shape and just getting back on the mat and competing again," said Patefield.
"We need to have our plan of how we want to attack our opponents," said Koch. "The team is going to learn a lot and will need to grow up quickly to be competitive. I love the wrestlers' attitudes and how they are responding with the adversity in the room."
The goal is to schedule home competitions for following years.
Coach Koch is hopeful the LCC fanbase will continue to show their strong support.
"This team is young but hungry," said Koch. "I know they will compete and will get better every week."
Both Garcia-Perez and Patefield also shared a message to their fans.
"We would like to thank supporters for taking time out of their day to support our LCC team wrestling."
