![Broadcast, yearbook and newspaper combined for 66 Interscholastic League Press Conference awards this year. Yearbook won 43, newspaper won 14 and broadcast took home nine. “I think [the ILPC awards] are a great way to give the kids some acknowledgement for all of their hard work,” newspaper and yearbook adviser Paige Hert said. “They typically spend the year covering everyone else’s big moments, so it’s really cool for them to be celebrated so many times and in so many different ways.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/edited-ILPC.jpg)
![Looking down at his racket, junior Hasun Nguyen hits the green tennis ball. Hasun has played tennis since he was 9 years old, and he is on the varsity team. "I feel like it’s not really appreciated in America as much, but [tennis] is a really competitive and mentally challenging sport,” Nguyen said. “I’m really level-headed and can keep my cool during a match, and that helps me play a bit better under pressure.” Photo by Kyra Cox](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/hasun.jpg)
![Bringing her arm over her head and taking a quick breath, junior Lauren Lucas swims the final laps of the 500 freestyle at the regionals swimming competition on date. Lucas broke the school’s 18-year-old record for the 500 freestyle at regionals and again at state with a time of 4:58.63. “I’d had my eye on that 500 record since my freshman year, so I was really excited to see if I could get it at regionals or districts,” Lucas said. “ State is always a really fun experience and medaling for the first time was really great. It was a very very tight race, [so] I was a bit surprised [that I medaled]. [There were] a lot of fast girls at the meet in general, [and] it was like a dogfight back and forth, back and forth.” Photo by Kaydence Wilkinson](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Kaydence-2.7-23-edit-2.jpg)
![As her hair blows in the wind, senior Brianna Grandow runs the varsity girls 5K at the cross country district meet last Thursday. Grandow finished fourth in the event and led the varsity girls to regionals with a third place placement as a team. “I’m very excited [to go to regionals],” Grandow said. “I’m excited to race in Corpus Christi, and we get to go to the beach, so that’s really awesome.” Photo by Addison Bruce](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/brianna.jpg)
The best wrestlers from across the state will gather at the Berry Center in Cypress, TX this weekend to compete for a spot on the podium at the State Championships.
Seven T-Wolves, along with Coach Richard Eckley, left to a DEN sendoff today. These athletes are seniors Tristan Fay and Rachel Corley, junior Max Brandt, sophomores Cade Haskins and Gavin Wood and freshmen Nathan Reilly and Jet Mentel.
“Tournaments take a long time and typically you [compete] every hour or so,” Corley said. “Duals are really fun. They are really hyped up around the team and everyone is cheering for everybody. Every meet or tournament will go in weight order. I enjoy the competitiveness of meets like when you are warming up for a match, seeing your opponent and getting ready to wrestle them. Our team as a whole is looking really good going to state. We have quite a few athletes and I think we will have a couple state placers and even some state champions.”
During practice, the team focuses on conditioning their bodies and working on the drills they use in matches such as different pins, turns and takedowns. They also focus on live conditioning, where they wrestle each other to give them the most realistic match-like practice.
“For the bigger meets we have throughout the season, we’ll usually start the week off with harder practices,” Brandt said. “Usually doing 30-45 minutes of live wrestling then some sprints for conditioning. Then towards the end of the week we tone it down a bit and start to do more drills and stretches to keep our bodies from getting too banged up so we can be at our best for that upcoming tournament.”
Since a new head coach came in this school year, the athletes have had to adjust to the new coaching style while also continuing to build their own team chemistry. According to Corley, the team has to just keep going and focus on the benefits the team has had with a new perspective and push forward for the goals they have as a team.
“I like how close knit our team is,” Corley said. “I made a lot of friends that I wouldn’t have met otherwise and we support each other in a lot of ways. We cheer for each other a lot, we like to coach each other. We will even go mat-side at tournaments and I have even won matches because of other people telling me what to do. Strengths of our team are how close we are together and we have to have a lot of trust in each other. It’s a really genuine environment to be in.”
The support of teammates has an impact on the performance of the team. As they prepare for the state tournament, the mindset and hard work each partner has put in to make all seven athletes better will come into play during their matches to come.
“My favorite thing about the team is the connections I’ve made,” senior David Postelnicu said. “I basically have another family away from home. I feel a lot of love from my wrestling family. I feel comfortable with the whole team to express myself and be myself everyday. Advice I would give people interested in wrestling is to give it a shot. You might be better than you think. It’s going to be hard but the reward is going to be worth it. Stick to your team, don’t distance yourself and build that family because they are going to get you places.
