Doyle Excited To Get Started As Head Coach Of Wheeling Park Wrestling
Trending
WHEELING - The way Danny Doyle looks at it, this had been a long time coming.
Doyle is set to take over as head coach of the Wheeling Park Patriots wrestling program for this upcoming season, a position that has had a member of the Doyle family at the helm twice before. Brother Jack Doyle and cousin Sean Doyle had been the head men for the Patriots in years past, and this year, Danny will find himself in familiar territory for his family name.
"I knew whenever I got into coaching, and got into teaching, that this was a role I would one day want," Doyle said. "It's nice that this position has been filled previously by friends and family, so it's nice to step up and follow in all of their footsteps."
Matter of fact, the Doyle family as a whole has been a wrestling family in different times and places across the Ohio Valley. For Danny's part, he is a Wheeling Park alum who in his 2009 senior season was an OVAC champion and state runner-up. He wrestled for four years at West Liberty.
Doyle had previously been an assistant coach at Magnolia High School and a head coach at Brooke High School, and has been an assistant at Wheeling Park for the past six seasons. The hire is expected to be made official next week.
He is taking over for Brian Leggett, who had been the Patriots' coach for six years. Leggett is becoming an assistant principal at Park, and is going to help the Wheeling youth program along with Jack and Sean Doyle, while also helping the high school team as much as he is able.
After being in the building for six years as an assistant, Doyle anticipates a "smooth transition."
"It's going to be a very smooth transition," Doyle said. "The coaching staff is going to be mostly intact. Everybody who has been around the program is still staying around the program. The transition is going to be extremely easy."
Doyle's team is coming off a season where many competed at the state tournament. Of those who made it to Huntington last year, the majority are returners, including Carrington Polus, Jake Carman, Nate Hodge, Jack Lowe, Noah White, Jameson Maynard, Malaki Washington and Hunter Means.
"I'm excited to see the kids that we've had on the team the past two, three years continue to make jumps and continue to improve," Doyle said.
"We're returning almost all starters. Our team next year is going to be a ton of returners so we should have a good core group of guys coming back."
Wheeling Park finished eighth as a team in Class AAA at the state tournament. Doyle is aiming higher at the helm.
"We won a state championship in 2021," Doyle said of his vision for the program. "Obviously it's to get back to that level and I don't think we're very far off right now."
Park's team have already begun to get together this offseason, and many have gone to a variety of different camps in the summer.
"Whenever the official season starts, our guys would've already had a lot of time on the mats," Doyle said.
"It's all business as usual."