Words like pride, hard work, and team might be alien to some. For others, they are just lofty rhetoric used to sell Gatorade.

For Coach Paul Keysaw, though, and the fifty guys vying for a spot on the Fresno City College wrestling team, these words are essential components of their state-title producing machine.

Last Monday marked the beginning of the fall season. Like many of his wrestlers, Keysaw is in his sophomore season at FCC. Just one year ago, the new head coach was staring at a similar-looking group of Rams that would eventually go undefeated and win the state championship.

During the weeks and months that followed, their state crown fluttered into obscurity. The public continued to ignore their win until Coach Ed Madec (another freshman coach) and his team won the state championship in basketball. It suddenly became necessary to acknowledge the wrestling team’s great accomplishment.

During what became nothing more than hand-me-down festivities for the group of grapplers, the team carried scowling faces and fake, worn-out smiles; they’d won the title months before. Where was their party then?

In preparation for this article, this reporter followed the Rams wrestling team to two consecutive practices. My presence was not entirely welcomed.

“Now we’ve got the press following us around,” Nick Bardsley said while wading in the pool. That didn’t happen last year, he said, “nobody cared.”

There is no denying that although two teams won the state championship last year, one team got more publicity than the other. I’ll give you one guess – if you said the wrestling team, you’d be wrong.

The wrestlers have every right to feel bitter. They beat out every junior college in the state of California and they went undefeated all season, but did anyone really notice?

Some people did, but did they get their pictures splashed across the front page of the Fresno Bee or even The Rampage? No.

We can tug at our collars all night on this one, but that fact of the matter is: we let these young men down. Everyone who ignored each of their dual and tournament wins, their individual crowns and top rankings is guilty – we let them down.

With nobody watching, they accomplished the improbable. And for that, they’ve more than earned just a little recognition. It’s the least any of us can do.

The road to a state title win is not without its bumps and hills to climb, and unfortunately, there are no express lanes.

“If it was easy to become a champion, everyone would do it!” Keysaw yelled from the top step of Ratcliffe Stadium during a recent practice. His team was busy running drills up and down the stadium steps during what he calls, “Hell Friday.”

Young men, often shirtless, baked under the summer sun while they struggled to complete the drills. Their hardened bodies glistened and their sweat-drenched hair swung wildly about their faces.

Keysaw dubbed the first drill, “The Buddy-Carry.” Like a Vietnamese woman carries her child, they labored up every step with a man of similar size on their backs.

While the carrier bore the weight, the carried whispered words of encouragement into their ear.”Come on man, almost there. Just a few more steps,” the teammate said.

When the carrier tripped, he’d catch himself on all fours in an inclined pushup position with his cargo still latched on his back.

“Get up, you can do it,” his teammate would say.

When they finished buddy-carry set, they moved on to wheelbarrow carries. One man grabbed the ankles of the other and, much like the name suggests, pushed them up the steps like one would push a wheelbarrow. The man-turned-wheelbarrow crawled up each step on his hands with his feet in the hands of his teammate.

The deltoid and tricep muscles in their arms swelled and convulsed with each connection of hand to concrete step. Their shoulder bones rocked up and down in their sockets while beads of sweat dripped from the tips of their noses.

Men cried out and screamed through the last steps, often resting on their elbows to catch their breath. This was no cakewalk.

Keysaw called on his wrestlers by name and dished out bits of encouragement to bolster their confidence.

“Get your [butt] up here Jose!” Keysaw yelled. Then, when Jose made it to the top, Keysaw said, “Great job, now get down there and do it again.”

Keysaw shouted over the moans, the groans, and the pants of his men as he paced from one side of the upper deck to the other.

“Nobody is as strong as the Rams. Nobody!” he yelled.

As the young men trotted down the steps to prepare for another drudge up the summit, they passed morsels of assurance to each other. “How many more sets do you have…Alright. Let’s go. We’re almost done.”

“I bet you’re thinking, ‘What did I get myself into?'” Keysaw shouted from the south side of the bleachers. “Nobody said this was going to be easy men.”

Along one side of the upper deck and beneath the shade of a tree’s hanging limbs, the team’s heavyweights panted and labored up and down their secluded staircase.

Hidden there, the wrestlers who weighed more than two hundred pounds endured Keysaw’s inferno. These select few, without a doubt, made up the most vocal group in the stadium that day.

“Let’s go fat boys,” Tyler Blair said, setting himself to carry Jason Fonzi up the flight of stairs.

Blair’s eyelids slid back and his eyes widened. The corners of his mouth lifted at their edges, forming an almost psychotic smirk.

Fonzi’s gorilla-like arms draped over Blair’s shoulders and loosely around his neck. Blair was the slimmest of the group, weighing slightly under two hundred pounds. He competed at 197 in last year’s state tournament and at 6-1, he’s one of the tallest on the team. With Fonzi riding his back, it looked like something out of The Great Panda Adventure.

Blair drove each foot into the concrete like the tip of a jackhammer. He muscled up the steps gripping onto Fonzi’s hamstrings. The rest of the heavyweights cheered him on until he reached the top.

“Don’t stop until we get another ring,” Victor Leyva said between his gasps for air.

“I already got one ring, but I want another one so I can flip you off with two hands,” Blair said to no one in particular.

They lined up single file and took on the stairs over and over, pausing momentarily at the bottom as the snake curved around and up the steps once more.

Their heavy-burdened feet smacked against the concrete with assurance and lifted like piston caps, propelling them to the next step.

With their fingers stretched out flat, they chopped at the air in front of them as if they were cutting a stock of celery. Watching these men pump their knees up and down beneath their bulged out frames was a sight to be seen.

“No water, we haven’t earned it,” Leyva said. Under the most dire circumstances they settled for a washout, but they didn’t drink. It was as if water was a luxury saved for the most worthy and they hadn’t earned the privilege yet.

“Wrestlers are different, but heavyweights are a different animal all their own,” Keysaw said.

The team rounded out their sets on the stairs with two 100 yard dashes and one for 50 yards. When that was through, they finished with 25 pushups and sit-ups.

The team huddled to conclude practice. With patches of grass on their sweat-soaked backs and their hands stretched towards the nucleus where Keysaw stood, the team let out one loud, “Rams!” and walked off the field.

“Why do you put these guys through such hell?” I asked during last Thusday’s practice.

“Because our season is hell, Joe” Keysaw said. “Our season is hell.”