By Mike Pearson
FightingIllini.com
Twenty-year-old Lucas Byrd has been wrestling "unofficially" since the age of three, but he's never had matches as challenging as he'll encounter this week at the NCAA Wrestling Championships in St. Louis.
He's one of five Fighting Illini athletes who'll be competing at the Gateway City's Enterprise Center. The 133-pounder will be joined by teammates Dylan Duncan (141), Danny Braunagel (165), Zac Braunagel (184) and Luke Luffman (heavyweight).
Seeded No. 7, Byrd brings an overall record of 11-2 to St. Louis, following his third-place finish at the Big Ten Championships. In part, his competition at the nationals is familiar. Among the 33 wrestlers at 133 pounds are eight Big Ten wrestlers, Byrd wrestled and defeated four of them in 2021.
His only so-called "Achilles heel" has been fourth-seeded Austin DeSanto of Iowa, a competitor who's dealt Byrd his only two losses this season. The first time they met was Jan. 31st in Iowa City, with DeSanto handing Byrd a 15-4 decision.
On Mar. 6, they met again at the Big Ten meet. It was a much more competitive match, but Byrd lost again, this time by a 5-4 score.
"That was a tough one," Byrd said, "because deep down I know I should have won that match. It was extremely winnable. At the end of the match, DeSanto says to me 'I respect you. You've made a lot of improvement.' I looked at him and said, 'Hey, I'm comin'!' I'm very happy with how the second match went. Losing sucks, but I'm closing the gap and I'm going to keep closing in on the top guys, and then I'm going to be the top guy."
According to Illini head coach Jim Heffernan, confidence is definitely not a shortcoming for Lucas Byrd.
"Lucas thinks he's going to win every match," Heffernan said. "It doesn't matter who he's wrestling. That's what you want. You want a kid who's confident and thinks he can win every time out. That goes a long way. The biggest thing with Lucas is, because he's young, we have to keep him out of his own way. He still needs to respect these guys and still needs to approach it like there's going to be hard matches. None of that bothers him. He would rather it be hard than easy."
That might explain the tattoos on each of Byrd's arms. On his right arm are the words "What I had I gave". On his left arm is an equally prophetic phrase: "What I saved I lost." Byrd explained his reasoning.
"For my first tattoo, I didn't exactly know what I wanted, but I did know that I wanted a quote that kind of stuck with me," Byrd said. "I was really close with my academic advisor at LaSalle (High School in Cincinnati). So she wrote those words on a piece of paper. And I said, 'Sounds good, that's what I'll get'. So I got the tattoo."
A few weeks later, he was visiting the wrestling room of nearby Elder High School.
"There was a big panther (Elder High's mascot) on the wall," Byrd said. "On one side of the Panther were the words 'What I had I gave' and on the other side it said 'What I saved I lost'. And I was like 'Well, I'll be damned. She gave me a quote from a rival high school.'
"But I haven't regretted it at all," Byrd said. "It's something I live by. The 'What I had I gave" means that you gave everything. You don't save anything. There's no point. You only get one shot at life, at wrestling, at academics. You only have one chance, so why not give everything. The second part—'What I saved I lost'—to me it means whatever you saved, you wasted it. That's not what I want to do. I want to use everything that was given to be the best me."
The University of Illinois wasn't Byrd's original choice, having committed to attend Maryland as a high school sophomore. Then, in his senior season at LaSalle, the Terrapins made a coaching change and Byrd re-opened his recruitment. His prep coach was Illini wrestling alum Ryan Root.
"Because of Coach Root, we attended summer team camps at Illinois," Byrd said, "so I had a feel for how Illini coaches ran practice and how they interacted with people. When I began considering other schools, I decided that it was going to be hard for me to turn down a full ride to a school that's three hours from home."
Combined with a redshirt freshman record of 11-4, Byrd now owns an impressive 22-6 record over two Illini seasons.
He majors in Recreation, Sports and Tourism at the University of Illinois, but Byrd's current plans to eventually turn to a career in coaching will have to wait. Once he gets his degree, he wants to contend in the popular Ultimate Fighting Championship competition.
"During quarantine, I was working out at a gym in Harrison, Ohio called Drive Mixed Martial Arts," he said. "It really kind of stapled in that I really want to try fighting in the UFC."
Speaking of his summer quarantine, Byrd had an interesting off-season, actually being infected with the COVID-19 strain. Fortunately, he didn't have any lingering symptoms.
And, oh, yes, we should explain how Byrd is a 17-year veteran of the wrestling mat. You see, his dad would often take young Lucas to his older brother Max's practices.
"I remember watching Max at practice, walking around and trying to do moves," Byrd said. "I just looked like I was rolling around. So, at about age three, my dad stuffed some pillow cases, sewed them together, and made what was like a little wrestling dummy. That's when I started and I would wrestle with the dummy every day. I had no idea what I was doing, but I was on a wrestling mat and I was playing with a doll that my dad had made for me."
There'll be no inanimate wrestling objects for Lucas this weekend, just a bunch of tough, 133-pound dudes.
Reminds Heffernan, "Having a conference-only schedule, we've only seen the best guys in the country. So, I expect Lucas will have a good weekend in St. Louis."
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