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Princeton Packet Athlete of the Week

Sottile starting strong for Cougars

By Justin Feil, Assistant Sports Editor
  Alex Sottile wasn’t thrilled with his sub-.500 record last year, but the first season of varsity wrestling at Montgomery High School prepared him for a breakout season.
   ”It did help,” said the MHS junior. “It was good experience last year. Definitely, it’s paying off.”
   Like many in the Cougars wrestling room, Sottile wasn’t content with just an OK start to his high school career. He wrestled plenty over the summer to prepare for a tough 152-pound weight class. A years experience and the off-season work are showing up in matches already.
   Sottile opened the season with a second-period pin of Bruce Horner to ignite the Cougars’ 42-27 comeback win over New Egypt last Friday. The next day, he won three straight matches to capture the 152-pound title at the Garden State Classic hosted by Princeton High School.
   ”It was the first tournament that I’ve won,” Sottile said. “I was a little surprised. I was kind of expecting that weight class to be a little tougher. Last year, at 152, there seemed like a lot more tougher guys.”
   Maybe that is how far he has come since last year. No one was tougher than Sottile, who helped the Cougars finish third in the team standings as one of four MHS wrestlers to win their weight class.
   Alex Sottile is the Princeton Packet Athlete of the Week.
   ”Like any other sport, things start to make sense to you after a while,” said MHS head coach Kevin Jacoutot. “If you wrestle smart, you can beat a lot of guys. He’s beating guys the right way. He’s not making any mistakes. He’s being really smart. He’s got a lot of mat sense.”
   Mat sense is hard to measure specifically, but easy to recognize. Jacoutot has noticed the change in Sottile this season.
   ”He knows what he has to do, and what he shouldn’t do,” Jacoutot said. “He’s starting to get all these things down. You can see he understands how to do things the right way. He’s starting to get it now.”
   Acknowledged Sottile: “Just from wrestling matches, you get used to it. It kind of came from last year and some summer tournaments. It was good competition. I wrestled some good kids in the summer and it got me ready for the season.”
   Sottile and the Cougars stayed unbeaten with a 57-18 win over Rutgers Prep on Tuesday. He worked for a 3-2 win over Jamie Eisenman.
   ”It was cool to see how a team that beat us last year pretty bad, we came back and took it to them,” Sottile said. “Our team is looking pretty good in the lower weights. And I feel like we have some strong guys between 145 and 189. I feel like we have some pretty good guys. I think we should have a pretty good season.”
   A year of experience is a huge help for the Cougars. They didn’t know fully what to expect when they took to the mats last year. Sometimes they were too anxious. Sottile and his teammates have started to understand what it takes to win.
   ”He’s impressed me more so than anybody,” Jacoutot said. “His mat sense is incredible. He looks like he’s starting to understand the subtleties of the sport, how you have to wrestle.
   ”The biggest mistake is guy go for the pin right away and they get a mistake and it’s over. It’s like someone throwing a bomb as a quarterback every play. They want to get it over quick. The way he’s wrestling, he’s thinking, and he’ll beat a lot more guys this way. We want to not just beat the poor wrestlers, we want to beat everyone we can.”
   Sottile has beaten everyone he has faced going into today’s schedule match at home against South Brunswick before the Cougars wrestle at Ocean City on Saturday. His philosophy has remained consistent in each match, whether it was a dual or an invitational like the Garden State Classic.
   ”I really had no idea what kind of teams would be there,” Sottile said of Saturday. “I’m still fairly new to the sport. I don’t really know what other teams are well known. I know some teams, who’s going to be good and who’s going to be bad. Regardless, I try to wrestle the best I can.”
   Sottile has helped point the Cougars in the right direction from the first match of the season. He opened his season with a big win to help MHS rally by New Egypt.
   ”He pinned a guy and turned the match around,” Jacoutot said. “We gave up a forfeit and they had a 15-point lead, then he got the ball rolling. He created a lot of momentum and we got going from there. He started a chain of pins. Then he won against good competition Saturday. Alex is a gutsy kid and a team leader.”
   The solid start to his year hasn’t changed his outlook on the season. He remains steady and focused on his next opponent.
   ”I don’t want to have too high of expectations,” he said. “I just want to wrestle hard every match.”
   That mindset along with a jump in mat sense has produced a terrific start to Alex Sottile’s junior year. It gives the Cougars another wrestler in the middle weights that they can rely on in the tougher matches.
   ”We always knew he had potential,” Jacoutot said. “He lacked confidence in areas. His confidence is soaring. He had the physical attributes. He’s a strong kid and good athlete. He’s a tough-minded kid. All those things seem to be paying off this year.
   ”In this sport, that’s what happens. You build confidence and roll with it. Like with any sport, you can lose confidence overnight. I expected big things. It seems like everyone is clicking. Hopefully we can ride momentum into counties (Thursday) and have a good showing there.”