Hard at Work
February 11, 2003 01:52 PM | General
February 11, 2003
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- At nine years old, wrestling against the current state champion for the sixth time in the same year, West Virginia senior Billy Smith nailed the biggest victory of his career.
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| Senior Billy Smith owns a 16-4 record heading into Friday's match at Pitt. (All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks) |
In the five previous meetings, Smith had come up short. With each loss, he narrowed his opponent's margin of victory but could never quite turn the tables his way.
The sixth time was the charm.
In deliberate fashion, Smith won the match and in that victory, determined that wrestling would forever be part of his life.
Throughout grade and middle school, the Greensburg, Pa., native played baseball and football in addition to competing on the mat, but by the time he got to high school, wrestling would be his only passion.
"My cousin actually got me started wrestling, so it wasn't even really my first choice as far as sports go," he says. "But, throughout elementary and middle school, I had a lot of success with it, and it became a part of me -- of who I was. I tried other sports, but they never really did it for me. I just really liked the one-on-one competition of wrestling."
Learning how to cut weight and stay hydrated aside, life as a wrestler hasn't always been easy for the Mountaineers' 149-pounder. It seems much of his collegiate career has been spent battling injuries. After a stellar freshman campaign that saw Smith climb to third on the all-time freshman wins list, the physical education major was forced to sit out his sophomore season due to a knee injury. And last season, a re-aggravation of that injury hampered his performance toward season's end.
Being a married man – Smith married his high school sweetheart, Nikki, in July of 2001 – and knowing that his future plans included a return home to run the family's dairy farm, the decision to forego a fifth year at WVU would have been understandable.
But not to Smith.
"I came here with a goal, to win the national championship," he says, "and I haven't done that yet."
A two-time NCAA qualifier, Smith's chance of returning to the national tournament as a senior is solid. He began the year by winning the Navy Classic and the WVU Open for the second consecutive season. Currently, he boasts a 16-4 overall record with two of his losses coming to a higher ranked wrestler.
The one dim spot in an otherwise bright season was the 53 second fall he suffered to Josh Daugherty in a dual with Ohio State. With the match hanging in the balance of Smith's performance, this particular defeat was quite difficult to stomach.
"I was so prepared to go out there," Smith says. "I had eaten right, cut weight right and warmed up well. Mentally, I was prepared. Coach told me right before I went to the mat to stay relaxed and stay intense, and that made sense to me at the time. It seemed that everything was fitting together for me to get the victory."
But, the win didn't come. Smith shot in and Daughterty took him down off the shot. Daugherty got him on his back, and Smith was unable to get out. With that, the night went to Ohio State and Smith's chances of winning the kind of match he's dreamt about since childhood disappeared in less than a minute.
Fighting through the despair of the situation, Smith found his teammates at his side, supporting him in his moment of defeat, and looked inside at the character he has built through the years of battling one injury after another, and rebounded beating his next opponent, 10-2. It was a victory that helped the Mountaineers secure their first shutout victory since 1998.
"At the time I was very disappointed," recalls Smith. "But in the locker room after the match, my teammates were all saying that the loss wasn't my fault, that other guys lost their matches too. I was devastated, but it helped knowing that they were behind me."
In a season that's featured what Smith considers the worst loss of his career, much can be said of the lesson he learned when he was nine: if you work hard enough and want to succeed bad enough, the big win will come.
As far as achieving his goal of a national championship is concerned, the third time just might be the charm.
