McTague saw a dream come true through Wrestling
By Dick Steele — Keep Sporting, Keep Fit
It was a true dream for Brian McTague of Morris when he won the IHSA state wrestling championship at 132 pounds in 1982.
McTague’s father, Jerry, was a standout football and basketball player at Morris Community High School in the 40s. Brian said his Father let him make the decision on what sport or sports he wanted to particate in. Brian's dad was also on the school board.
“I was very fortunate to make my own choice without any pressure from my father. A lot of people don’t realize that I kind of grew up on the hardwood floor. My dad was a referee and played himself on the basketball court.” McTague said. "My father stressed sportsmanship,
behavior in the class room and he let me choose what I wanted to do.”
McTague said it was a true dream of his to be a wrestler and state champion.
"When I grew up, my brother Dave and Cousin Mark both wrestled and they were older than me," he said. "I grew up watching them, the Dergos and Enersons wrestle,so that’s what I chose to do.”
When discussing his road to the state championship, Brian had this to say
"You've got to have luck and skill, and I just had some raw natural talent that really helped me along with the coaches that I had," he said.
Brian started playing basketball in fifth grade at Garfield School in Morris.
"They shipped us over to Center School to play basketball. I was O.K. in basketball, and all my friends played," he said. "Some of my friends said let’s go over to Shabbona and wrestle. You really could not be on the team back then, but for whatever reason, I could beat an eight grader when I was in fifth grade in my weight class in wrestling.
"Something just clicked. It fit my personality. Any time you have success at an early age, the minds starts clicking,saying I like this.”
While wrestling at Shabbona, McTague qualified for state competition in seventh grade and finished in second place during eighth grade in the Illinois Kids Wrestling Federation (IKWF). His coaches in grade school were Keith Benson and Mike Golimowski.
Later in high school, he was coached by Don Funte and then Herb Shaw for three years. Brian wrestled on the varsity all four year in high school.
During his freshman year, he wrestled at 105 pounds. He finished fourth in districts and three advanced to sectional competition. However, one wrestler was injured and Brian, being the alternate, advanced to further action. He went up against the eventual state champion from Joliet West and took his lumps in the match.
Brian said you remember things like that — the typical freshman versus the senior syndrome.
During his sophomore season he lost four or five times, but broke his thumb which slowed his progress.
Brian mentioned that each year, he would gain more and more confidence.
McTague played three sports — baseball for four years, football for three years and also cross country and he wrestled for four seasons.
In his junior year (126 pounds), he qualified for state competition, but lost his match at state in the first round. Brian lost only twice his junior year.
His four-year record at Morris was 120 wins, 19 losses and one tie, which places him third on the all time list. John Dergo is first, Stuart Jelm is second and McTague and Brenton Valentime are tied for third.
When his senior year rolled around he wrestled at 145 pounds and 138 pounds and settled in at 132 pounds. He lost only once during the year and that was to Johnson of Urbana and
that was early in the season. Brian lost 3-2 in that match. He later defeated Johnson soundly in the sectional finals. McTague said that the early loss really set a fire under him.
"You have to have some luck," he said. "I had several close matches and a couple overtimes during the state tournament.”
In his first match at state, he wrestled Ross of Lincoln and won on a pin. He beat Parker of West Chicago 10-6, but it was a tough outing. His third match was Van Royan of Skokie West, and Brian won in overtime on a referees decision 4-2.
Brian takes us through the state championship match.
“So then you’re in the finals, the Grand March and the dream is getting closer and closer," he said. "I ended up wrestling a kids from Crystal Lake South (Don Wallace), who was 34-0. It was another overtime match. I had coach Shaw fan me with a towel to cool me down going into the overtime. I remember hearing my classmates and friends cheering in the background, 'Brian, Brian, Brian'.
”You never forget something like that. Things went my way and I ended up winning 4 -2 in overtime. I cried like a baby afterwards. To this day I did not know if I would be going to college or not, but with luck and everything went my way, I ended up getting a scholarship to Southern Illinois at Edwardsville.”
When I asked Brian about his college wrestling career, he talked about the competition.
”As you well know, weather it is John Dergo or whoever, and you’re the key dog at little Morris high school, and you go to college, you are just the same as everybody else," he said. "It was a great situation for me and my education and my wrestling career. My freshman year, I cracked the starting lineup a couple of times. We were a Divison II school, but we wrestled only Division I schools. We wrestled Iowa, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State. It was just a phenomenal program that we were building.
"When I left school, we were national runner-up, three-time national champions and another national runner-up. My years at school were just outstanding and it was never like that again.”
McTague was a three time All-American, placing fourth ss a sophomore at 150 pounds. In Division II competition, he placed second for national runner-up. Brian wrestled at 142 pounds his senior season and was also national runner-up.
McTague said he believed his strength in wrestling was his defensive ability to feel something happening before it actually happened.
"If you were to try a move on me, I felt it coming early and reacted, stopped it and then made my move," he said. "It was just a natural instinct, that was a God given gift that really helped me.”
McTague said his mother (Sis) and father never missed a single match of his from grade school through high school, missing only a few in college. Brian said when he umpired softball, his mother was in the stands.
Brian currently works for McGrath Office Equipment in Joliet. He and wife (Cori) have three sons Justin (12), Shane (10) and Justin (5).
Brian said he coached 11 years at Braidwood High School and then at Morris High School for six years — three as head coach. McTague retired as coach this year to spend more time with his family.
Brian and Larry
Hartley started the Little Redskins wrestling club about six years ago.
Brian McTague had a dream of becoming a state champion and his dream came true.
Our NFL guru’s did really well this week. Nick “All Business” Vidito and guest Roger (Mailman/Deputy) Gilbertson recorded 13 right and only 2 wrong. Tony “The Wonder Boy” Darin and I were both 12 and 3. Professor Don Neushwander was 11-4 for the week.
Nick leads the pack at 91/40, Tony is second at 90/41. I’m in third place at 88/43, followed by Neush at 87/44.
The Bears deep sleep will continue this week when they travel to Minnesota and meet old friend Brett Favre.
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