A Pony Kind of Pressure

Pressure. It’s something that just about every athlete and every team faces at one time or another. Yet, the Havre High wrestling team seems immune to it or maybe they just know how to deal with it better than their opponents.

But one thing that there is no doubt about is that the Blue Ponies have been the power of Class A wrestling for the past two decades and that doesn’t appear to be changing any time soon.

One reason the Ponies have become such a force in Montana wrestling is their ability to dominate on the big stage. Havre is good everywhere, but the Ponies take their game to another level when they step inside the Rimrock Auto Arena at the Billings Metra, a place that might as well be their second home, thanks to all the favorable memories there.

“I don’t know what it is,” Havre senior Kody Pribyl said. “Maybe it’s all the people or the noise, but some kids just freeze up when they get out there at state. We have wrestled well at state, our whole team has. We are just used to it and feel good with it.”

The Ponies’ success is all the evidence needed to backup Pribyl’s statement, especially with the current run Havre is on, winning the last three state championships and being considered a heavy favorite to capture a fourth this weekend at the All-Class state meet in Billings.

Yet, Havre head coach Scott Filius said he and his team don’t think about things like that. When asked what it would mean to the team and himself if the Ponies were able to win a fourth-straight title, which would tie a school record, the coach responded: “I guess I never really thought about it. We are just focusing on this year and have never really tried to put it into context. The kids do all they can and all they can win is this year.”

One thing that makes wrestling interesting, and in particular, the state wrestling tournament interesting, is the fact that there are two definite kinds of pressure: Pressure on the team and pressure on the individual.

There will certainly be pressure on all the Ponies to win matches and titles to help the team win. Yet, some will also face the pressure of wrestling for a state championship, and seniors like Pribyl and Logan Pleninger, will be forced to confront the pressure of trying to win a state title their senior year, when they have each been denied three times before.

“You have to treat it as just another match,” Pleninger said. “You have to go out there and do your job. You can’t get too excited for it because your worst enemy is yourself.”

Both Pribyl and Pleninger have been through the grind that is state wrestling and when each gets back on the big stage today, neither will be shaken because they have their experience to fall back on.

“That experience really helps,” Pleninger said. “All you can do is keep learning from all those experiences.”

Talking about experience, few in the Havre lineup have more big-match experience than Parker Filius and Jase Stokes. Both are juniors are both are two-time individual champions with their sights set on a third state title.

The implications are obvious. If both Filius and Stokes can win state titles the next two seasons, they would the first four-time champions in the history of Havre wrestling, which is no small feat.

“I guess it will come down to who wrestles first to find out who gets it,” Stokes said. “I still have to wrestle and I will have tough matches, but I know I will do it. But, I still have to go out and wrestle.

“There is some pressure still,” he added. “But not like there has been like my freshman or sophomore year. Everyone just goes out and scores points and that’s what we have been doing for the last three years.”

Yet, experience doesn’t necessarily mean much when you get out on the mat. Sure, it might help you keep your head in a tough situation, but as Mike Tyson once said: “Everyone has a game plan until they get punched in the mouth.”

The problem for the rest of Class A is that it’s usually Havre that comes out and lands the first blow. But there is a reason for that. The Ponies don’t just win by accident, they win because of hard work and intense preparation. They win because they seem to handle the pressure better than any other team, and any other wrestlers out there. And they seem to handle the pressure of being expected to win, of being the best, time and time again.

“The state championship is always the goal,” coach Filius said. “That is the goal for every program that puts the time in. We have had a lot of success because we have had great kids, great parents and great administrators. We take these kids all over in the summer to wrestle and we put more pressure on ourselves than anyone.”

That’s why when many succumb to the pressure on the biggest stage in high school sports in Montana — and the Ponies never seem to. And this weekend in Billings, they should be expected to thrive on it once again, because after all, they have been doing it for decades.