By BRIAN CUNNIFF
CAPE MAY COURT HOUSE – The start of David Giulian’s high school wrestling experience didn’t exactly go very well.
“We took him to camp with us the summer before his freshman year, and he went 0-6 and got hurt and we had to have his mom come pick him up,” Middle coach Matt Wolf recalled with a bit of a laugh.
Fast forward to Wednesday, when Giulian’s mom, Amy, and father Karl, stood with their son to celebrate a massive accomplishment.
Giulian became just the fourth wrestler in Middle Township High School history – but the second in his own family – to record 100 career victories with a victory by fall at 215 pounds in 1 minute, 20 seconds in the Panthers’ 56-24 victory over Cedar Creek.
Giulian joins 2018 graduate Gary Nagle (104), 2019 graduate Romeo Rodriguez (111) and 2020 graduate Karl Giulian (104), his older brother, as the lone Middle wrestlers to eclipse 100 career victories.
“It’s a great accomplishment, especially when you consider COVID and everything else he had to overcome,” Wolf said. “He had a lot of work to do when he got here to get better but he put the time in and it paid off. This is a kid who’s never lost more than six matches in a season, and then obviously he didn’t even have a full season last year because of COVID.”
Giulian improved his season record in 2021-22 to 19-2 with the victory.
“Dave didn’t really start real young in wrestling,” Wolf said. “He got started as a seventh-grader when his brother Karl got here as a freshman. He’s just made the total commitment necessary to get him to where he is today.
“We’ll now only have four kids on that (banner on the gymnasium) wall with 100 wins and to have two of them come from the same family, that’s pretty cool.”
Middle improved to 10-4 with Wednesday’s win over the Pirates. In addition to Giulian, Don Nelson (126), X’zavier Swinton (132), Alick Killian (150), Brian Juzaitis (165) and Kani Perry (Hwt.) each won by fall. Adrien LaBoy (144) won by technical fall, Connor Rowlands (113) was a winner by decision and Dante Jackson (103) and Max Adelizzi (190) earned wins via forfeit.
Middle’s scheduled match with Lower Cape May on Thursday has been postponed. There was no immediate word on whether it will be made up.