As one of the Middle School Caoches in this district I see Beeson's point. I (luckily) do have support from our local club the Young Guns and my son(8) is in the club as a wrestler. At this point I only have 1 kid in my middle school who does not wrestle for me but wrestles for the club. His father and I have had a conversation and if he could do both he would, however, he is in a point race for being ranked #1 in the nation and I understand his desire to accomplish this goal and I wish him well. The biggest thing any middle school coach can do is to get with their club coaches and see what they are doing. I run a version of our club practices using the same terminology as the club and I try to get my wrestlers who have not wrestled club to go to the club for the State series. I currently will have 6-8 kids who will go to the club after junior high season who did not wrestle for the club before season and I appreciate all the help our local club has done for me as a coach and for the kids in my room. I wish our season was before Christmas but I do not see that changing in the near future. The best solution would be wrestling both or the movement of the Pioneer league season until one of these happens you are always going to have the same debate.

Brian Means
Eisenhower Middle School Coach