When Daily Journal Wrestler of the Year Marco Spinazzola earned the narrowest of defeats over longtime peer, Bishop McNamara’s Luke Christie, in the IHSA Class 1A 152-pound state championship last month, it was the culmination of more than a decade of devotion to wrestling.

It all started when he began jujitsu training at the ripe age of five years-old, something he pursued for a few years, until he was first introduced to the sport of wrestling.

“I always loved the idea of jujitsu and fighting like that, but wrestling was more aggressive, less of a sneaky game, and so it was more my style,” Spinazzola said. “And so the second I got a taste of wrestling, I kind of leaned more that way, and my dad [Michael] saw it too.”

Ever since that first moment Spinazzola got onto the mat, he fell in love with the sport, leaving him to ditch his jujitsu training in order to master his new craft. As the years went on, he eventually got better and better to the point where he was able to claim third-place (112 pounds) in the IESA Class A State Finals during his eighth grade year.

From that moment onward, coming so close to a IESA state title as an eighth grader, Spinazzola had his eyes set on becoming a state champion. And although he knew it would take some time, Spinazzola believed by the time he was a junior he could make his dream a reality. But after falling a tad short with a IHSA Class 1A sixth-place finish at 138 pounds last season, he came back for his senior season this year will the sole focus on becoming a state champion.

Spinazzola saw his dreams become reality at the State Farm Center in Champaign last month, but the drive south on Interstate 57 wasn’t the only path he had to take to get there.

There was also a necessary path of progression Spinazzola made within himself.

As focused as Spinazzola was during his make or break senior season, he had gone through some off-the-mat issues midway through the year, which resulted in a suspension from wrestling. And as easily as he could have thrown himself a pity party about having to be briefly dismissed from the squad, Spinazzola capitalized on his time away from the team, leaving him to come back better than ever before.

“When I first got news of my suspension, I knew it was going to be a long time, but I didn’t put any thought into how it would go day-by-day,” Spinazzola said. “...It scared the hell out of me, honestly, and it lit a fire up my[self].”

Blue Devils coach Philip Thorne, one of those who’s been closest to the newly-minted champion over the past handful of years, immediately noticed a change when Spinazzola returned.

“He came back and totally changed,” Thorne said. “He was focusing on his faith, reading books, acknowledging himself and focused on eating correctly.”

That attitude allowed Spinazzola to continue perfecting his craft once he finally returned to the team at the end of January, allowing the 152-pounder to celebrate a dominant 40-3 season that culminated the area’s only individual state championship after he took down Christie 2-1 in an overtime period during the IHSA Class 1A 152-pound state championship match last month.

“I got up and said ‘screw it’ and wrote down a bunch of goals,” Spinazzola said. “…I thought it was time for me to make a whole change on my own because I clearly wasn’t doing a very good job and getting in trouble every move I made, and so I ate healthy, prayed, read books and worked out downstairs in my basement everyday.”

As an adolescent facing discipline at school and losing the opportunity to do what he loved, it wouldn’t have been a surprise for those outside of the Peotone locker room to see the star grappler become a “what could have been” story.

But any opponents who may have thought that had to routinely come to the conclusion that they couldn’t stand in Spinazzola’s way.

On his path to his trip to Champaign, he won the Joliet Catholic McLaughlin Classic, the Walther Christian Hoger Invite and went 8-0 at the Petersburg Abe’s Rumble before later being dismissed and eventually returning for the Litchfield Rich Lovellette Tournament one week prior to the beginning of the postseason.

His return came with a vengeance, as he began his postseason journey by winning the Reed-Custer Regional, followed by a second-place finish in the Coal City Sectional that helped qualify him for his second trip to the IHSA State Finals at the University of Illinois’ State Farm Center in Champaign.

He opened his state finals journey with a 3-0 record, setting up a title clash with McNamara’s Christie for the fourth time this season after having previously lost to him twice, including the sectional title match. The familiarity with Christie afford the two titans to head into an overtime period tied 1-1, which was still the score as the final seconds of overtime wound down before Spinazzola secured a last-second escape that gave him a 2-1 victory.

Spinazzola’s state title win helped give the Blue Devils their fourth state title winner in program history, following the likes of Joe Izzi (1998 &1999) and Paul Keane in 2018.

“I almost feel bad for that match because that match could have gone either way,” Spinazzola said. “If it weren’t for such good technology when we were down there [at state] the referee could have made a different call…if that was a regional or sectional tournament they wouldn’t have been able to call that last second escape so easily.”

Wrestling a familiar opponent who has become a friendly competitor after years of facing off on the mats, the sorrow Spinazzola felt for his comrade after the match was almost as equal as the elation he felt for himself.

“It’s not like I didn’t deserve it, but somebody had to get the [win],” he said. “I just feel kind of guilty just because of how close it was. …I respect Christie so much and he could have won the title just as easily.”

The respect for his longtime area foe was evident given the numerous battles the two opponents had over the years, especially over this past season where the two friends took their friendship to another level after talking on and off since they were both freshmen.

“Christie has probably been my biggest competition ever, because usually with opponents I never go back and forth with them,” Spinazzola said. “Either they beat me every time or I beat them every time and they progressively get closer scores, and so actually having someone like Christie, where it was a coin toss every time, it was fun.

Despite the off the mat incident that led to his brief dismissal from the team, coach Thorne had nothing but high praise for Spinazzola and his leadership tactics that helped produce three first-time IHSA State Qualifiers — Micah Spinazzola, Santino Izzi and Alex Cardenas — alongside the leadership of Thorne and new assistant coach Jeremy Kenny this past season.

While Spinazzola had a state champion in Keane to wrestle with at the start of his high school career, after emerging on the right side of a stormy path, Spinazzola is now the next Blue Devil wrestler that can be someone the program’s younger grapplers can learn how to be a champion from.

“Without ever saying anything he stepped up into that leadership role and did a fabulous job by helping the kids who were new to the sport, directing his little brother Micah and buddy Santino Izzi,” Thorne said. “...Marco’s knowledge being spread to those guys I think really helped them to start to have belief they could become state qualifiers and state champions.”