“Between wrestling and competing and my family and everything else, it can get pretty hectic,” he said. “But I really try to keep that boring routine. It just seems like I’m more successful that way.”
But in everything from scouting seniors to shooting single legs, Scott does things a bit differently.
The young gun
Scott doesn’t have a signature coaching stance. It’s more of a signature squat.
In a near-perfect catcher’s stance, Scott squats down to get on the same level as his wrestler. His hands form a cup around his mouth, constantly projecting instructions for his players.
Scott’s players can feel his poise, even when they’re in the heat of battle.
“Coach Scott definitely calms me during my matches,” said redshirt junior Joey Ward. “When he gives you that look, you know its time for business.”
Despite his calm, mature demeanor, Scott’s pose gives him away. With a signature squat like that, there’s no hiding his youth.
For a 29-year-old in his first year as a head coach, Scott is the new kid to Division I coaching, and he has received some criticism for it.
“People dog on us all the time about it,” Scott said. “But that helps us more than anything because we’re willing to change, and we’re willing to keep our minds open.”
Despite his youth, Scott mentored two ACC champions and helped send seven Tar Heels to the NCAA Championships.
“What we lack in experience as a staff, we make up for in effort,” he said. “We make up for it on the mat with those guys.”
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Not too old to thump you
Except for the few hours every week that he has to dress up and holler instructions from the sideline — in his super squat, of course — Scott probably won’t tell you what to do.
He’ll show you.
“Wrestling is a feel sport,” Scott said. “I can’t just stand there and tell a guy how to do something.”
Scott is one of the few coaches in the nation who joins his players on the mat. He can’t just stand and watch.
Playing for Scott doesn’t just mean learning from a national champion and Olympic medalist, but actually wrestling against one.
“A leader is someone who does the work with them,” he said. “We strap our shoes on, and we scrap with them.”
Scott’s coaching staff views wrestling with its players as an advantage. Being young has its perks, after all.
And if one of his wrestlers isn’t engaged, Scott uses the wrestling mat to get them back in the learning mood.
“It also helps, if guys aren’t responding one day, that you have a coach that can come in there and thump you a little bit,” said assistant coach Neil Erisman.
A model for success
Even when he doesn’t know it, Scott’s players are watching him.
If wrestling with his players is a rare experience, being coached by an elite wrestler as he competes is one no other player experiences.
“I get to look at him as a model,” Ward said. “I see what he does the week before a big competition or the morning of a big match, and I use that to prepare the same way.”
Scott’s preparation carried him back to the U.S. Olympic Team Trials on Sunday, where he was the only Division I coach competing. Wrestling at 57 kilograms, he reached the semifinals but fell short of a return to the Olympics.
His 30th birthday five days away, Scott knows the competitive chapter of his wrestling career is nearing its close.
But Scott knows he can still affect the careers of those around him as a coach.
So it’ll be back to hitting signature squats and joining his players on the mat.
It’ll be back to his same old simple, boring life.
@_Brohammed
sports@dailytarheel.com
