Potomac Falls alumni have made their way back to their former school to help coach their former team. The new junior varsity (JV) head coach Michael Oswald wrestled from 2005-2008 with the program.

“I was a two-time state qualifier and got third at regionals my senior year,” said Oswald.

Having a former wrestler who knows what it takes to reach the state level will help this year’s team achieve their goals.The wrestling team is coming off a season where the team fell just short of their team goals, so they would love nothing more than to come out strong this year.

“[My goal] is to be a state champion, but also to help my teammates improve as the season goes on,” said senior Owen Bolyard.

The new coach does not lack experience and is looking to help out the younger wrestlers. The biggest challenge for the freshmen is learning all of the techniques. Coach saw there was an opening at the JV level and jumped at the opportunity to help out the younger wrestlers.

“I decided to come back and coach because I was working in the area and I wanted to give back and I saw there was a spot open for JV coach and stepped up,” said Oswald.

Being the head JV coach Oswald has to make sure the younger wrestlers are caught up to speed. As the mentor for the JV team he knew he had to take a different approach than he would have as a wrestler, as a coach you have to be aware everyone is at different levels.

“[Oswald] wrestled [at Potomac Falls] he knows what the program is like” said senior Christian Hyde. The team was happy to have another experienced coach join the team. The addition of the new coach is good for the younger wrestlers because it gives them a coach who can give full attention to help the JV wrestlers, while before the varsity coaches had to bounce around between JV and varsity.

“ [Coming back to coach] changes your perspective you have to realize it may be simple to you because you have it memorized , but some freshmen are learning it for the first time,” said Oswald. It is important to the team to make sure the freshmen know the basics, so the team has contributions from every level of the program.

Panther wrestlers are excited to have alumni back at the school to coach them.

“It’s nice [to have alumni come back] it means we have a good program and they wanna stay in the program and help out with what they’ve built in past years,” said Bolyard.

Having younger coaches around is nice for the wrestlers because they know what wrestling season is like. The younger coaches can relate to the wrestlers more than the older coaches simply because they have gone through it recently and know the challenges of being a student-athlete

“He [coach Oswald] gets it he was recently a graduate of Potomac Falls High School and he knows what it was like to go through the program and he knows how it should be and he teaches it as so,” said Hyde.