Oklahoma High Schooler Goes It Alone : Youth Is Team Wrestler Without a Team

Robert Jackson, 17, is a high school wrestler with no coach, no sponsoring school, no training equipment, no teammates and no thought of quitting.

As a sophomore and junior, he wrestled for McLain High School. The school’s wrestling coach last year took another job. State law prohibited hiring another coach until certain teaching positions were filled. When they weren’t, the 20 young men who brought their aggression off the street to the mat were told to take it home.

Nineteen of them did.

But Robert Jackson was different. Without a coach all season, Jackson enrolls himself in wrestling tournaments. He personally calls the athletic directors of the host schools. He explains that he is a team wrestler without teammates. He asks if he might participate anyhow. He’s never refused.

He goes to the matches alone, pays his own entry fee, and goes home alone. There have been matches without one McLain fan for its one wrestler.

He recently placed fifth out of 150 wrestlers after grappling a grueling six matches in as many hours. He was exhausted. Fatigue never overcomes determination for Jackson.

He had heard before that he couldn’t wrestle, when he began the sport at age 15.

“They said I was too old to start, and a lot of people knew I was too far behind,” he said. “But I just trained real hard.”

That first year, Jackson lost two-thirds of his 15 matches.

But he listened attentively to coaching. He was determined that it be quality time, and that quality time make up for lost time.

In his second year of wrestling, Jackson faced opponents with four times the experience. He finished with 11 wins and two losses. This season, he is 15-6. He won 11 of the contests by pins. A pin is to a wrestler what a shutout is to a baseball pitcher.

When the McLain wrestling program collapsed, so did his access to training facilities. Jackson’s opponents train with weights and Nautilus equipment. Without the mechanical aids, Jackson can’t lose enough weight to wrestle in his 148-pound class. He faces foes 10 pounds heavier.

His opponents build endurance running on tracks with their teammates to the cheers of their classmates.

Jackson runs four miles alone in a north Tulsa neighborhood past barking dogs.

“When I run, I concentrate on my moves,” he said. “Since I don’t have any teammates, I can’t practice my takedowns. So I have to rehearse them in my mind.”

Then Jackson moves and dodges and executes against an air partner. It’s “pretend” practice. But it’s practice.

“The team has quit,” he said. “I won’t quit. Not ever.”

Jackson goes to vocational-technical training from 8 a.m. until 11 a.m., then to high school until 2:45 p.m., then into the self-induced training until nearly dark. Then there’s homework, which has earned him a 3.0 grade average, then there’s bed, then there’s more mental rehearsal of wrestling. In the dark, Jackson shuts his eyes and sees the brightness of the mat.

“I want to get a scholarship,” he said. “I want to wrestle. I want a team and a coach.”

There was a lot of effort by a lot of parents in December to retain the McLain wrestling program. When Jackson vowed to wrestle without official support, McLain gave him a singlet. That’s the name of a wrestler’s uniform. Jackson wore it once. He isn’t sure why, but he put it away. Then he bought his own.

Not many young men take the rigors of a high school wrestling curriculum. For seniors, it’s as hard physically as would be changing schools emotionally.

That’s Jackson’s next quest.

On Thursday, Jackson applied to leave his beloved McLain, in the middle of his final year, in the middle of wrestling season.

He wants to go to East Central High School. There is a wrestling team there. It has support. It has a coach. Jackson can match his determination with the coach’s instruction.

The new school is 10 miles from Jackson’s home. He thinks he can find a ride. If not, he said, he can run.

And on Jan. 25 at Edison High School, three days before he hopes to begin at East Central, Jackson will wrestle one more time as a one-man team.

It could stand as the last McLain wrestling match ever. Jackson really hopes he wins that one. And he wouldn’t mind if there were someone from McLain there to see him. It would be nice, he said, but not necessary.