Strawberry Crest’s wrestling team recently won Western Conference and now has the best record in program history.
One of the current top wrestling programs in Hillsborough County is used to defying convention.
Strawberry Crest’s team, not even one decade old, has already fielded a state champion. It’s currently sitting on a 37-1 team record, the best in program history, and is finding success with a mix of homegrown talent and transfers. It recently won Western Conference and, with a handful of meets left in the regular season, looks primed to make a deep postseason run.
This year, the team is dealing with something new: recognition.
“Even within the school’s culture, it’s starting to get to where people want to help, even if they’re not part of the program,” head coach C.J. Gittens says. “I think that’s a great thing. The kids are walking around and you can definitely sense and feel the respect.”
The coaches do everything in their power to make the wrestlers feel that they’re not just boys and girls, but equals. Gittens and assistant coach William Knighten, who came from Plant City High School to join the Chargers’ program in the offseason, directly practice what they preach: they’re on the mats with the wrestlers at every practice, participating in mat drills and grappling sessions.
“This program would not survive if it wasn’t for him, because he brought so many great things to the program,” Gittens says. “Without him, there wouldn’t be the structure and the motivation that we have with the military background, the discipline.”
Gittens also credits coaches Will Terry and Abe Fernandez, as well as the team’s network of parents and athletic director Jasmine Tramel, with lending invaluable support.
Gittens wants Strawberry Crest to know that this wrestling program is a big, diverse family driven by success. All that matters to the team is the will to work hard, help teammates and win.
“We have a quote that says, ‘If you want to succeed as much as you want to breathe, then you’ll win,’ he says. “We instill that in the kids’ minds. It doesn’t matter who you are … the success that you have, the success that you want, that’s a personal thing. Once that gets instilled in their minds, they start working better in school and they start working better on the mat.”
The message Gittens wants to get across is simple: kids from all walks of life that don’t think they have a place in sports should try wrestling for Crest.
In a perfect world, Gittens says, the team would have its own wrestling room. Unlike other area schools, Crest’s wrestlers have to occupy a space in the gymnasium from the front of the home bleachers to the back of the basketball court’s benches. They do not have a full mat to use, due to space constraints, so the wrestlers must make do with several mats held together by tape — which is constantly being knocked off and replaced once it loses its stickiness. The noise from basketball and, sometimes, cheerleading practices make it difficult to hear instruction given by Gittens and his staff, though they do manage to get by with visuals.
The team doesn’t blame administration for its practice situation, as the school itself has a huge student population that sometimes forces Gittens and other teachers to share classrooms, or even hold classes in the gymnasium. It is, however, hoping to eventually raise enough money to get out of the gym and into something else on campus where it can hold practices.
“With everything we have to go through, we still are prospering,” Gittens says.
Contact Justin Kline at jkline@plantcityobserver.com.
