Enzo Canali wrestled for one year when he was young and decided it wasn’t the sport for him. Coming into high school at St. Rita, he planned to play baseball and football.
But Canali decided to give wrestling one more shot as a freshman, and this time, it stuck. Now, it’s the senior’s biggest passion and lone sport.
“I was a big baseball guy,” Canali said. “I went to Rita for baseball and ended up focusing on wrestling. My big thing is there are zero politics in wrestling. There are politics in baseball about who’s going to play, who kids’ parents are and things like that.
“On the mat, the best man wins. That’s what I like.”
Lately, Canali has been the best man more often than not. He made it to state for the first time last season and won one match. He’s determined to make a bigger splash in his final season.
“Once I get in the right mind and everything, I’ll figure it out,” Canali said. “It’s just locking in and thinking about how this is the last year to do what I do.”
Canali, who is ranked No. 6 in Class 2A at 144 pounds, turned in an impressive performance to win a championship Saturday at Joliet Central’s McLaughlin Classic.
Canali (9-1) pinned Marist’s Thiago Estrada, slipped past Rich Township’s Tristin King 7-4 and topped Belleville East’s Dewayne Taylor 8-3 before shutting down Morton’s Caiden Robison 6-0 in the finals, handing Robison his first loss of the season.
“I was staying in good position, for sure,” Canali said. “I could have worked on getting my shots in a bit better, but I did a good job staying in control of the matches pretty much.”
Senior 150-pounder Nolan Keenan, who finished second Saturday, is one of Canali’s training partners for the Mustangs.
Keenan wasn’t surprised to see Canali dominate.
“We push each other a lot every day,” Keenan said. “It’s good. He’s grown a lot. He puts in a lot of work all summer, every summer. He’s always going as hard as he can.
“He earned his first place (Saturday), and he’s going to keep doing big things.”
Canali broke through as a junior to get to the state meet for the first time. He went 27-12 on the season. After finishing 1-2 at state, he left Champaign with a mission.
“It was a cool experience,” Canali said. “I went down there the year before and saw my buddies wrestle. Wrestling down there is completely different.
“All I thought about after the losses was that I’m still getting a lot better and I still have one year left. I knew I had a lot of time to keep getting better and go for it.”
Ryan Klinger, who was previously a volunteer assistant in the program, is in his first year as St. Rita’s head coach. He has seen a new sense of desire from Canali since the state trip.
“Whenever you get downstate and win a match and then you get bounced out without placing, that fuels that drive, 100%,” Klinger said. “He’s been fueled ever since then.
“He knows what it takes to get down there and he knows what it’s going to take to get it done down there, so he’s all 100% effort, no reserve.”
Klinger has also noticed a ton of mental growth in Canali.
“It’s always staying composed,” Klinger said. “He used to maybe get rattled a little bit when he got scored on. Now he just gets out of it right away and comes back and scores. He just stays with it.”
Canali is confident he can keep that composure under the biggest spotlight this season.
“It’s just taking in the big moment,” he said. “That’s where a lot of people fold under pressure. Just getting used to being in that moment last season and being under pressure was the biggest thing that I think can help me this year.”
