Columbus East’s Tommy Morrill is The Republic Wrestler of the Year. He is pictured in the wrestling room at Columbus East High School in Columbus, Ind., Wednesday, March 1, 2023.
Mike Wolanin | The Republic
When Tommy Morrill was wrestling junior varsity as a freshman at Columbus East, he never envisioned himself becoming a state medalist.
But over the past three years, Morrill has transformed himself into one of the top wrestlers in the Olympians’ rich history. He won sectional, regional and semistate titles and finished third at state at 220 pounds as a senior this season and is The Republic Wrestler of the Year.
“Honestly, no, because I was at 195 at that point, and I was battling James Sawyer for the varsity spot,” Morrill said about his expectations as a freshman. “He could beat me in practice, so I knew I wasn’t quite good enough for varsity yet. My sophomore season is when I realized, ‘I’m starting to get pretty good at this. I’m starting to win a lot.’ I was a sectional, regional and conference champ as a sophomore, and I was like, ‘Things are starting to come together, and I definitely think that by my senior year, I could place pretty high.’”
Morrill didn’t start wrestling until his seventh-grade year at Northside Middle School.
“I tried a lot of sports when I was younger,” Morrill said. “I tried a lot of Parks and Rec soccer, but then I hadn’t been doing any sports, and then seventh grade, my parents were like, ‘You need to pick something to do. It can be a club, it can be a sport, but you just need to try different things.’ I didn’t have a club I was interested in or didn’t have a sport I was interested in, and my parents and brothers convinced me to try wrestling, and from there on, wrestling has been my thing.”
His step-brother Jacob Shaver was a sophomore at East at the time, and brother Sam Morrill was a freshman for the Olympians.
“They were like, ‘You should just try it. Just try it one day and see if you like it, and then come back. I tried it, and it was like, ‘It was OK,’ and then I kept going and I fell in love with the sport,” Tommy said. “I definitely felt like I improved in my eighth-grade year, compared to my seventh-grade year. My seventh-grade year was not great. But then eighth-grade year, I did a lot better.”
After wrestling mostly JV as a freshman at East, Morrill won the varsity spot at 220 as a sophomore and remained there through the rest of his career.
“My freshman year, not that I was out a lot, but there were times that I was out sick,” Morrill said. “Really, you just kind of have to push through that. Coming to practice the days where you don’t feel great or your stomach might be acting up, just putting in the time on those days when you don’t feel like coming to practice is what can get you better.”
Morrill qualified for state as a junior, but lost in the first round.
“It comes down to participating outside the room, going to different clinics, going to RTCs, going to offseason tournaments that the team doesn’t make you go to,” Morrlll said. “During the offseason, we go to Evansville, Virginia and Disney, but between my junior and senior season, I participated in four or five other meets other than that. Really, putting in the time there is what really makes a difference. I kind of saw that difference in play as I was able to get much further than I did last year.”
Morrill finished 41-2 with 24 pins this season, with both of his losses coming against 220-pound champion Will Clark of Crown Point. Clark won an 11-3 major decision early in the season, but only 7-3 in the state semifinals.
“I would describe his year compared to last year is, his maturity level improved quite a bit,” East coach Chris Cooper said. “He learned to control his nerves. He had been to state before, and he wanted to be a state champ. To take a match that was an eight-point match and wrestle him two months later to where it was two points late in the match was just a credit to the year Tommy had.”
“Really, I couldn’t have done it without the support of my family, team and coaches,” Morrill added. “I honestly couldn’t be happier. Of course, I would have liked to have taken first at state. Who doesn’t want that, but coming all this way and wrestling against the kid that I lost to earlier this year, I closed the gap at state, so I definitely feel like that I competed a lot better against him, so I could tell that I had improved, which I was happy with. Of course, I wasn’t happy about losing that because I definitely feel like if I beat Clark there, then I would have had a shot at winning state. But coming down to it, third at state is a big deal, and I think the season that I put together, I’m happy with.”
Morrill’s career path was similar to that of his brother Sam. Sam wrestled mostly JV as a freshman and sophomore and ended up finishing second in the state at 170 pounds as a senior.
“(Tommy) totally transformed his body,” Cooper said. “He’s been one of the hardest workers in the room. He didn’t miss a day of practice this year. It’s just a credit to him to get to the point where he is now.”
Cooper also lauded Tommy’s leadership.
“Tommy is a great human being,” Cooper said. “The way he handles working with our freshman or other wrestlers on our team or even our youth, everybody looks up to Tommy. He’s such a great ambassador for our program. He’s a great wrestler, but that’s much more impressive.”
Morrill is planning to attend Purdue and major in video game development and design through the Purdue Polytechnic school.
“I play a lot of games,” Morrill said. “Ever since I’ve been little, it’s been a dream of mine to work on games and stuff like that. I’ve looked into it, I’ve tinkered around on my own with developing games and I just find it interesting and something I think I’d like to do in the future.”
Continuing with wrestling, however, is not in Morrill’s plans.
“I haven’t necessarily been recruited, but I’ve had coaches call me and ask about it, and coaches text me and ask about it,” Morrill said. “Honestly, it comes down to, I love wrestling. I really do. But I just don’t think I’m going to continue with it in college. It’s just a big commitment. Especially wrestling for a Big Ten school is a lot of work. I don’t mind putting in the work. It’s just, I think I’ll leave it here.”
The 2022-23 Republic All-Area Wrestling team:
Tommy Morrill, Columbus East: The senior won sectional, regional and semistate titles and finished third at state at 220 pounds.
Jackson Fox, Columbus East: The senior won sectional and regional titles, finished fourth at semistate and was a state qualifier at 182 pounds.
Pat McMahon, Columbus East: The senior won sectional and regional titles and made the semistate quarterfinals at 285 pounds.
Talon Jessup, Columbus East: The freshman won sectional and regional titles and made the semistate quarterfinals at 106 pounds.
Liam Krueger, Columbus East: The senior won a sectional title, finished second in the regional and made the semistate quarterfinals at 126 pounds.
Gage Rutan, Columbus East: The freshman finished second in the sectional and third in the regional and made the semistate quarterfinals at 120 pounds.
Justice Thornton, Columbus North: The sophomore won sectional and regional titles, finished fourth at semistate and was a state qualifier at 132 pounds.
Asher Ratliff, Columbus North: The freshman won a sectional title, finished second in the regional and made the semistate quarterfinals at 145 pounds.
Liam Phillips, Columbus North: The senior won a sectional title, finished second in the regional and was a semistate qualifier at 160 pounds.
Lane Kirchner, Jennings County: The sophomore finished second in the sectional and regional and made the semistate quarterfinals at 132 pounds.
Teagan Trotter, Jennings County: The senior won sectional and regional titles and was a semistate qualifier at 170 pounds.
Honorable mention
Brown County: Jackson Reed. Columbus East: Nate Anderson, Caleb Cooper, Tyler Lake, Bo Wagner. Columbus North: Keller DeSpain, Josiah Green, Jose Ramirez, Nolan Riley, Evan Saevre, Jason Shuey, Cody Thurnall. Jennings County: Evan Sochacki.
