Last Saturday, Wilmington senior wrestler Logan Van Duyne spent his day winning the IHSA Class 1A Coal City Boys Wrestling Regional 190-pound championship, and also making time to have some laughs with his coach, Nick Dziuban.

Before Van Duyne returns to Coal City for next weekend’s sectional in hopes of clinching a third straight trip to the IHSA State Finals, he’ll be spending this Saturday with hundreds of others inside the Wilmington gym to mourn the blindsiding loss of his coach.

Dziuban, who had defeated multiple bouts with cancer since his initial diagnosis in 2020, died Monday after taking a sudden downturn Sunday. He was 37.

For Van Duyne and most of his teammates, the sudden death of their beloved coach is the first case of serious grief they’ve dealt with. And they’re doing it the way Dziuban would have wanted them to – together.

“It’s just being able to be there for one another,” Van Duyne said. “We just keep coming into the [wrestling] room. The unspoken thing is that we’re all there for each other. ...

“It was definitely a sad thing, but it’s helping bring us together,” he added. “When we first got the news, we were just telling different stories we had, our coaches were telling stories from when they wrestled together or our other coaches coached him. It’s just helping us get through it.”

A 2007 Wilmington graduate who excelled in baseball and football in addition to wrestling, Dziuban made his way home after a college baseball career at the University of St. Francis and a brief – but to Coalers wrestling coach Mark Masters, an impactful – stint at Coal City.

One has to try hard to find someone around Wilmington who didn’t have a great affinity for a man that Wildcats athletic director Brian Goff described as a friend to everyone.

“He was always just so positive,” Goff said. “He was good with the kids, just such a friend to everybody. Just such a good guy. You say that about a lot of people, but truly a good guy. ... If he could do something for you, the question was never ‘Should I,’ it was ‘When do you need it?’”

One such instance of that Goff saw was when Dziuban, who was also the school’s building trades teacher, offered to use his skills to build some stuff for his son when he needed it. Rob Murphy, Dziuban’s own wrestling coach at Wilmington, said that whenever he stumbled upon Dziuban while he was teaching, the same traits he saw in the wrestling room were present in the classroom.

That’s why Dziuban was the perfect man to replace him as the school’s wrestling coach after he retired in 2022.

“When he was in the classroom, he was coaching those kids,” Murphy said. “He was good with all those kids; they loved his classes and it was just a good fit. As an administrator, you don’t want to bring someone in from outside, and sometimes wrestling coaches are a little hard in the head and tough to deal with. You want the right person to do the right thing. That was Nick.

“He was going to do the right thing and be the right person. That reflects on the kids and made them better people.”

Take care of others

Van Duyne was never able to take Dziuban’s class, one that builds actual homes in the subdivision next to the high school. But as the godson of Dziuban’s brother CJ, Van Duyne has known Dziuban his entire life and even worked on building crews with him over the summer.

That’s where Van Duyne perhaps learned his biggest lesson from his coach, even more than anything he learned on the mat.

“He was always such a good mentor and handing out advice,” Van Duyne said. “One thing he never really told me but just kind of showed by example was to take care of the people around you. If we were at a job site, he’s taking all of his workers out to lunch. He’s treating me well because I’m doing something for him, and that’s something I’ll always take with me.”

By the time he was promoted to the head wrestling job, Dziuban, who was also the JV and eighth grade baseball coach, had already been defeating his disease for two years. It spread essentially all over his body, primarily his colon, liver and brain. But up until the hours before he died, Dziuban never let the multiple surgeries or rounds of chemotherapy or radiation keep him from the school.

“Never give up; that’s what the whole sport of wrestling is about,” Murphy said. “You’re gonna get beat, I don’t care who you are. Even [legendary wrestler Dan] Gable got beat once. It’s how you respond to when you get beat, and he demonstrated to never give up. Don’t feel sorry for yourself, you’ve got to keep battling.”

Wrestling with heavy heart

Van Duyne was the lone Wildcats wrestler to advance from last weekend’s regional round to next weekend’s sectional. While he’ll now only be able to rely on his head coach in spirit, Van Duyne will be supported at Coal City – and potentially beyond – by assistant coaches Jake Murphy, Rob’s son, and longtime assistant Eddie Van Duyne.

Preparing for such a grueling sport while grieving is as difficult as it gets for an athlete, but it’s something they’ve already talked about.

“Yeah, we’re going through a tough gig, but think about what Dziuban would have wanted,” Logan Van Duyne said. “Dziuban’s been helping me for three years, and when he coached me in middle school, what would he want me to do? He wouldn’t want me to sit around and mope. He’d want me to do something about it.”

Dziuban leaves behind his wife, Amanda, and their daughter, Kennedy Rose, whose birth is expected in June. Goff said that just like Dziuban was always looking out for others, the Wilmington community will be there for whatever Amanda and Kennedy Rose may need.

“You know this community,” Goff said. “We’ll help out and take care of as much as we can, as much as she wants us there. If she wants to have her child around her, we’ll make them a Wildcat.”