There was a time in the not too distant past — say, within the last five or so years — where the thought of St. Joseph (Met.) winning a GMC title couldn’t even be entertained.
It’s not just because South Plainfield had a decades-long stranglehold on the region nor because of any perceptions or preconceived notions about what went on at St. Joe’s.
Rather, it’s because the program simply didn’t exist. Forget not being a household name. There was no name to be had.
That’s all changing now, though, and quickly. In his fifth year at the helm of St. Joe’s, former longtime Woodbridge head coach Mike Carbone led St. Joe’s to its first ever GMC title over the weekend and did so resoundingly.
The Falcons crowned five champs and scored 299 team points, far outpacing Old Bridge, which finished in second with 241.
“South Plainfield’s had a stranglehold on this thing for 30-plus years outside of the random few teams that have jumped in there. It’s great to add our name into the hat of champions,” Carbone said. “It’s a mental message sent. They really worked hard for this and they wanted this. They had been talking about it since last year when we lost. It was a definitely a huge accomplishment for these guys.”
Among the champions for St. Joe’s was returning champ Gio Alejandro, who successfully defended his title while his four other teammates who won — Zach Beadling at 120, Evan Mendez at 150, Brian Christie at 190 and Jake Tulli at 285 — all won titles for the first time.
“All year we’ve been saying we wanted to win this tournament,” Alejandro said. “Every day in the room before practice, we’d say ‘GMC Champs.’ That’s been our goal as a team the whole year.”
For a lineup that starts seven underclassmen, Beadling, included, it was a positive sign of what’s to come in Carbone’s eyes. In addition, freshman Tyler Whitford made the finals while Morgan Schwarz and Julian Arango both finished on the podium as well.
“The freshmen and sophomores, we have seven of them starting and they’ve laid a foundation for the incoming freshmen to pick right up on and go,” Carbone said.
Mendez won his title as the No. 4 seed, upsetting No. 1-seeded Landon Kearns from Saint Thomas Aquinas in the semifinals, which sent the gym in Piscataway into a frenzy.
And he did all that after battling a skin disease, Carbone said. Carbone also pointed to Mendez’s past results against state medalists and state-ranked guys as a sign that people might be sleeping on Mendez
“Some wrestlers, when the lights get bright, they get tight and they want it to be a 2-1 or a 3-2 match. Evan has no fear,” Carbone said. “He had a bout with a skin disease that really held him out for a long time and now he’s starting to get his wind back and his record might not be the most impressive. But if you look at the guys he’s wrestled and the guys he’s beaten and who he’s lost in the state and the margins, he’s definitely making a case to be ranked or under consideration. He’s really an under the radar type of kid.”
It’s likely Mendez won’t be under the radar any longer and neither will heavyweight Jake Tulli who wrestled perhaps the most exciting eight and a half minutes of anyone in the gym on Saturday as he won his title by putting on a fierce ride in the final ultimate tiebreaker period.
The irony of it all, though is that had the match been last year or at the start of this year, things could’ve gone very different for Tulli.
“Top was actually my worst between bottom and neutral and all that stuff,” Tulli said. “So top is something I’ve really worked on during the offseason and in season and now it’s what I’m best at.”
Tulli was quick to credit his opponent — Piscataway’s Malachi Wyatt, too. And in a season where Tulli has wrestled the likes of Max Acciardi from Paramus Catholic or Rocco Bennett from Delsea, he said it’s Wyatt who gave him one of the best tests of the season.
And it was a match against Wyatt earlier this year where Tulli realized how much his own top game had improved.
“That’s really all that matters to me — making sure my teammates and everybody else is happy. I like to give a little bit of a show. Props to Malachi Wyatt. Guy’s a beast and a stud,” Tulli said. “He gave me one of the hardest matches I’ve had all year and I’ve wrestled some top-5 kids. He’s going places. He helped me put on a show for everybody here.”
St. Joe’s is going places too — Gio Alejandro, Vince Genna and the other upperclassmen are making sure of that.
They’re the first seniors Carbone has seen through all four years at St. Joe’s and they bought into Carbone’s vision early on when they didn’t have to.
“He [Carbone] knew when we went from freshmen to seniors that we were going to get more kids and would be one of the best teams in the state,” Alejandro said. “We all knew we would get kids and would work together to build a good team and be one of the best teams in the state and it’s working.”
“It means a lot. Gio and Vince Genna, they came in and they were like ‘we know you weren’t good last year, but we want to change that.’ They just built and talked us up and they’ve really been like ‘this room’s going to get better and we’re going to make it better,’” Carbone said. “Now everybody’s bought in. Now the incoming freshmen and the sophomores, they don’t know that they’re not supposed to work hard because these seniors have built this room to be what it is and that’s why we’re doing so well.”
St. Joe’s doing well though has come with a cost, though.
“People already don’t like us, so that’s how you know we’re doing something right,” Alejandro said.
And for a dormant program that didn’t exist five or six years ago to have this meteoric rise might be surprising and by virtue of St. Joe’s being a non-public school, that might rub some people the wrong way.
But whatever the perception is, there is also certainly an indication that what Carbone is doing has paid off.
And after decades of South Plainfield dominating the GMC and Old Bridge being on the rise and every other program getting a head start over St. Joe’s, now that the Falcons are successful, Carbone’s not apologizing for building a winner in such a short time.
“It’s a big deal. I do think other teams are taking notice and maybe they are upset but I’m not going to say I’m sorry,” Carbone said. “Because when we were down, they didn’t say they were sorry when they were stepping on our throats.”
The Falcons now also have a target squarely on their back in the GMC and as they continue to test themselves with a strong schedule — the best way Carbone feels to prepare his team and build a program, other teams are starting to take notice.
“It’s a good thing. It’s different when the bullseye’s on your back versus hunting. I always say here, we’re the hunted. When we wrestle teams like Bergen Catholic or teams like Paramus Catholic, we’re the hunters,” Carbone said. “Every week if you look at our schedule, there’s a monster on our schedule that we’ve wrestled. I’m proud of these kids that they’ve gotten through the schedule. There’s no rest for the weary here. If you can get a couple of top teams on your schedule — and we’ve done more than that — your kids are either going to rise or they’re going to fold. And right now, our kids are rising.”
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Jake Aferiat covers the SEC, Skyland and UCC. He can be reached at jaferiat@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @Jake_Aferiat.
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