By Mike Finn, W.I.N. Editor

Most folks will tell you the same answer to the No. 1 question that came out of the Walsh Ironman tournament:

            Where is Monroeville, Ohio?

            “It’s about 20 minutes from Cedar Point,” responded Chris Phillips, the father of the Ironman OW, the ninth-grader who goes by the same name and stunned every one in the packed Walsh Jesuit High School gymnasium, Dec. 9, when he upset No. 1-ranked Brian Roddy of Lakewood (Ohios) St. Eds in the 171-pound championship.

            That was the same answer given by the 119-pound sophomore Logan Stieber, a teammate of the younger Phillips and one of three Monroeville High School wrestlers who captured championships at this year’s Ironman.

            And if you really want to know where this 1,500-person community exists — other than its relationship to Cedar Point, home to one of the nation’s more impressive amusement parks alongside Lake Erie — ask Logan’s younger brother, Hunter, who completed the Monroeville trifecta when he captured the 103-pound championship.

            “Do you know where Sandusky is?” quizzed Hunter, as the freshman referred to the Lake Erie community, located an hour west of Cleveland. “Monroeville is about 15 miles south of that.

            “I get that question a lot from a lot of people.”

            The geographic question first became common in high school wrestling circles, including from college wrestling recruiters, last summer when this same trio also captured individual Cadet National championships in freestyle in Fargo, N.D.

            But their performance — and a sixth-place finish by 112-pound Monroeville freshman Cam Tessari, also a Cadet All-American — at the Ironman, considered one of the toughest national high school tournaments, was even more impressive considering all three of these Eagle wrestlers were less than two years old when the 14th annual event started in 1994.

            “I’m shocked,” said the older Phillips, who just saw his son score two of his three takedowns in the first period to outmuscle and defeat Roddy, 6-3. One of those takedowns was a fireman’s carry, which the younger Phillips executed to perfection.

            “That’s my best and favorite move. He happened to push in and I hit it,” said Phillips, who grinned in embarrassment while trying to explain why he and his teammates were not overwhelmed by the magnitude of this high school event. “I know I’m good at wrestling. I have nothing to lose right now. I just tried as hard as I could and won.”

            Phillips’ victory came just ahead of Logan Stieber’s 119-pound title. The sophomore finished second in last year’s Ironman at 103 pounds.

            “(Phillips’ win) pumped me up a lot,” said Stieber, who blanked Sam White of Massillon Perry High School, 5-0. “I knew that (Phillips) could beat (Roddy). I see him every day in the room. He’s a man.”

            But it wasn’t that long ago that Phillips was no bigger than the Stieber brothers.

            “We’ve been working together for so long,” said Hunter Stieber, who majored Devin Carter of Christiansburg, Va., 11-2, for the 103-pound title. “I’ve known all these kids who go to our school. Some got bigger like Chris Phillips, who used to be our size and I used to wrestle him.”

            That was back when they were in early-elementary school and their father Jeff Stieber, who never wrestled but was the starting point guard for the Monroeville basketball team in his prep days, found something to do with his active boys.

            “My oldest (Logan) was always an aggressive kid, who started going to wrestling and one thing led to another and my younger one followed behind,” said Jeff, who first put a wrestling mat in his basement and later in his garage to include a growing number of kids near Monroeville, who also wanted to wrestle, including Phillips who was in third grade when he joined the Stiebers.

            “Before you knew it, one thing led to another and people started hearing about us and wanted to come out and train with us,” said Jeff, who eventually looked elsewhere for training opportunities for his kids.

            One was the All-American Wrestling Club, located in LaGrange, Ohio — 45 minutes from Monroeville — and run by the father-son combination of Ron and Erik Burnett, a four-time Ohio state high school champion.

            “I remember I had just moved back from Pennsylvania and my father saying, ‘You have to see these kids,’ ” recalled Erik, who works with the older kids in the club. “Logan was nine and Hunter was even smaller, but my dad said, ‘They are going to be truly special.’ ”

            Burnett credits the kids’ families for creating a healthy environment for this boys.

            “When we’ve gone on a road trip, I never worried about them,” said Burnett, who entered them in national youth tournaments.             “(The parents) were good at finding people to help them,” said Burnett, who still works with the quartet in freestyle once the high school season is finished. “It’s all about getting better. It’s not all about winning.”

            The fathers of these wrestlers also sought out Jeff Jordan, the coach at Graham High School in St. Paris, Ohio, to work with the Monroeville kids at his summer camps.

            “I’ve been working with them for a long time,” said Jordan, whose Graham team won its first Ironman team title. “They are really tough kids. They have a great program up there and those kids are hammers.”

            And now Monroeville, which had less than ten wrestlers in its high school wrestling room before these youngsters arrived the past two years, has become the center of the high school wrestling universe, especially for college coaches who will be knocking on their doors.

            “We try to stay humble because wrestling is such a humble sport,” said Jeff Stieber. “You get too big out of your circle and you can get humiliated pretty fast.”

            “We’re just having fun and working hard in the practice room,” said Logan Stieber. “We have an awesome group of kids that we have been working with forever.”

            And it’s only beginning for Monroeville, Ohio, and its favorite sons.

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