'This program is going to last': Monty Tech honors late coach with memorial tournament
FITCHBURG — Aastin Smith looked out across the mats spread across the Bulldog Gymnasium floor and expressed one hope for the high school wrestlers who were participating in Saturday’s Kieron Smith Memorial Tournament.
“I just hope that every wrestler comes here to wrestle their hearts out,” Kieron Smith’s eldest son said, “because that’s what he would have wanted.”
Hired as head coach of the Bulldogs wrestling program in 2009, Kieron Smith was preparing for his 15th season at Monty Tech when he died unexpectedly, at the age of 51, last August.
Saturday’s tournament, organized largely by Monty Tech wrestling alum and California resident Dennis Begley, was the Bulldogs’ way of honoring a man whose passion for the sport was unbridled.
“Kieron was all about the kids wrestling and so that was what I was making it about,” Monty Tech first-year head coach Chris Godfrey said. “It didn’t matter about winning or losing or your best guys are coming or your worst guys are coming. It was about coming to wrestle.”
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Nine high school wrestling programs from across the state joined the Bulldogs at Saturday’s tournament. Nashoba Regional and Worcester Tech were on hand to represent Central Mass., while Nashoba Tech, Natick, Boston Latin Academy, Southwick, Weston and Oliver Ames also made the trip.
“It just showed that as we traveled around the state doing tournaments, how he associated with all of those coaches and teams,” Monty Tech Athletic Director Dave Reid said of Saturday’s turnout. “A lot of the schools had other meets at other places and they sent their second team or some of their jayvee kids just so they could honor (Kieron). He was a well-liked guy.”
Upon their arrival Saturday, athletes and spectators alike were provided a reminder of why they were at Monty Tech in the form of a wooden plaque featuring an etched image of Kieron Smith next to the quote, “Once you wrestle, everything in life is easy.”
Monty Tech coaches, wrestlers and their family members wore black commemorative T-shirts. The front featured the head of a bulldog surrounded by the words Kieron Smith Memorial Tournament, while the back featured the profile image of two wrestlers in a neutral position and another Kieron Smith quote: “If it was easy, everyone would do it.”
“That was something he said all of the time,” Godfrey said. “There were a few others but those are between he and I and we’ll keep it that way. Some stuff was said just in the room and that’s where we keep it.”
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Aastin Smith, who thanked all in attendance for coming and asked for a moment of silence during a pre-match speech, served as an honorary coach for the day and could often be found shouting advice or words of encouragement to a Monty Tech wrestler from the corner of a mat.
An already emotional morning and early afternoon became even more charged for Aastin Smith each time his younger brother Zackary Smith-Pratt, a Monty Tech freshman, stepped onto the mat to compete in a match in the 126-pound weight class.
“I love watching him wrestle and I know he’s out there wrestling his heart out. It’s got to be just has tough for him as it is for me, so him sticking out there and showing his toughness and still be encouraged to wrestle — and this was my dad’s greatest pride — is a lot,” Aastin Smith said as he wiped a tear from his cheek and his daughter, Prair, 5, and son, Braxdyn, 2, hugged his legs. “I give my brother lots of props for that.”
A graduate of Ralph C. Mahar Regional High School, Aastin Smith said he wrestled for his father as a youth, but later walked away when he became more interested in another sport. He did, however, return to the wrestling mat as a senior at Mahar and helped the Senators win a division title in 2015.
“I wrestled for him pretty much my whole life until I went to play basketball, which was kind of his nemesis. But he still enjoyed coaching me in any sport it was,” he said. “He didn’t necessarily like it, but he wasn’t going to stop me. He wanted me to play sports and be good at what I enjoyed.”
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Faith Maldonado, a senior competing in the 106-pound weight class and one of two young women competing for Monty Tech on the day, didn’t have the performance she would have liked while losing a pair of early matches wrestling against the boys, but she was able to see the larger picture.
“I’m just thinking about how I’m overall getting better and instead of thinking about these losses I’m thinking about how I’m working hard and I’m going to strive to get better for Kieron,” she said. “Kieron Smith was an inspiration for me. He helped me through a lot of things, like during my junior year when I was alone because my parents worked a lot. He was there to coach me and help me on the sidelines and he just meant a lot to me.”
Maldonaldo, who is studying house carpentry but said she will join her mother, father and uncle as an industrial painter following graduation this spring, said the piece of advance she learned from Coach Smith which she carries with her every day is, “work hard for what you want and you’ll achieve it.”
Xaedyn Natal, a Monty Tech junior, said every time he steps onto a wrestling mat now he does so in memory of Kieron Smith.
“He loved wrestling. He always drove people. He was passionate about it. He would always come here over work any day. I just loved him. It was hard to see him pass,” Natal said. “We tried to make it a strong point. Every time we wrestle it is for Kieron now. I told him that I would wrestle better for him and so I’m just trying to do that. That just goes for every other tournament, too. It’s just for him.
“We really love him and we’re trying to appreciate him and show how much he meant to us.”
Asked if Saturday’s tournament helped bring him a sense of closure, Aastin Smith paused a moment before answering.
“I don’t know. That’s tough,” he said. “We’re always searching for a sense of closure, but I don’t think it will ever really be a full one.”
Aastin Smith is moving forward the only way he knows how — by pushing his way through probate court in an effort to get his father’s business, K. Smith Concrete, in his name in time, hopefully, for a spring re-opening.
And he’s confident his father’s legacy will live on at Monty Tech wrestling, a program which boasts a roster of 35 athletes and which captured Saturday’s tournament with a total of 251 points, five weight class champions, four runners-up, one third-place finisher and two fourth-place finishers.
“He devoted his life to wrestling, so everything here at Monty Tech is just exactly what he would have strived for. With the program going how it is and everything as it is, there is nothing more I can ask for,” he said. “Chris and Ruddy (Paulino) are both great coaches in their own right, so I think this program has a lot to look forward to. This program is going to last.”
This article originally appeared on Gardner News: High school wrestling: Monty Tech celebrates late coach Kieron Smith
