Tim Ruschell has held many roles in his adult life including semipro football player, math teacher, coach, husband, father, grandfather, patriarch of Ryle High School’s first family of wrestling and Santa Claus.
Later this week, Gray Middle School is putting Ruschell in a red suit again and rolling him out as jolly old Saint Nicholas at the annual after-school holiday get-together.
Ruschell teaches at Gray.
“With my beard longer and grayer, I’m starting to look a little more like Santa Claus,” said Ruschell, 65. “Last year, I had a kid run right up to me saying, ‘Santa Claus, Santa Claus.’ It was cool. A 90-year-old grandmother told me Santa Claus was exactly what she needed for Christmas.”
On Saturday at another annual holiday season get-together, Ruschell played the role of wrestling coach at the 26th annual Raider Rumble at Ryle. A week before doling out presents in red and white Santa garb, he was providing a steady presence for the orange and black as his youthful Raiders grappled with some of the best wrestlers in Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana at their first meet of the season.
Twenty-one teams from the tristate area descended upon the Ryle gymnasium where 10 large wrestling mats lay side-by-side and wall-to-wall for more than 500 matches over a full weekend of competition that began with Friday’s junior varsity meet and ended with Sunday’s final-day activities. Somebody had to get the three-day event ready, and this is another role Ruschell relishes: Unroller of the wrestling mats.
“You still have to roll them out and put them down and clean them up.” the coach said. “But some of them are a lot lighter than they used to be so it’s not so much trouble any more getting them all straight.”
There’s something else Ruschell wants to get straight, even if it’s plainly obvious. This is the beginning of the Raiders’ season, Ruschell’s 20th as head coach and 27th overall. There is a lot of wrestling yet to be waged over the rest of the 2023-24 schedule.
“We’ve got work to do,” Ruschell said after the Rumble’s conclusion. “On Saturday in some of these matches when we were on the bottom, we had a hard time getting out. We have to do a better job of getting out and getting on top.”
Finishing on top of Region 5 is the yearly team goal at Ryle. The Raiders have won 11 regional championships under Ruschell’s direction, including the last three in a row and four of the last five.
If the power-packed Raider Rumble was any indication, the Raiders once again appear to be the regional favorites and a top-five Kentucky power capable of crowning a couple individual state champions before all is said and done at the 2024 KHSAA State Wrestling Tournament. The meet is scheduled for February 15-17 at Alltech Arena at the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington.
Ryle placed eighth at last year’s state meet, 111.5 points behind champion Paducah Tilghman and 88 behind runner-up Union County, which had won the previous seven state titles. Ryle was state runner-up in 2021 for the fourth time under Ruschell, who has yet to win a state crown. This, despite coaching more than two dozen individual state champions, including two of his three sons.
All of Ruschell’s sons followed him into coaching after wrestling in college like their father, a former regional wrestling champion and all-state football player at Newport Central Catholic. The elder Ruschell wrestled at Northern Kentucky University then played eight years for the Stroh’s Lions semipro football team. He eventually got back into wrestling. The love for the sport was just too strong to deny.
As it turns out, wrestling also has a hold on Keith Ruschell, coach Ruschell’s oldest son. Keith, now a Ryle assistant, was formerly head wrestling coach at Gray Middle School, where he was Kentucky middle school wrestling coach of the year in 2019 after guiding Gray to a fourth-place finish at the middle school state championships.
Keith, a former Ryle regional champion who helped the Raiders win their first regional title his senior season in 2002, is the transportation manager for the city of Florence.
“I brought him out of retirement,” said the elder Ruschell, who has sent nearly 20 wrestlers to NCAA Division I programs, including two of his three sons. “Keith had taken a few years off from coaching wrestling so we’re getting him back into it.”
Tim Ruschell has never taken a coaching break, one of the many reasons why his sons admire the man who made Ryle wrestling great. Kyle Ruschell, a former member of the U.S. national wrestling team and a two-time All-American for the Wisconsin Badgers is head wrestling coach at Tennessee-Chattanooga. Kyle Ruschell was the first two-time college wrestling All-American from Kentucky. At Ryle, he was a two-time state champion. Youngest son T.J. Ruschell, Ryle’s all-time victory leader, also wrestled at Wisconsin and later assisted brother Kyle as a coach at Tennessee-Chattanooga.
“My dad’s the man. Because of him, we got into wrestling,” T.J. Ruschell said.
So dogged was Tim Ruschell’s determination in life that not even a broken back suffered at work could derail him. It just sent him in a different direction. Over the next six years, he went back to college, became certified to teach and was hired at Gray Middle School. He placed his children into the school system and helped start the Gray Middle School wrestling program, moves that would eventually alter Ryle wrestling history.
“I thought breaking my back was the worst thing that could happen,” coach Ruschell said. “I wanted to make a positive out of a negative. I eventually got on my feet, switched careers and now I’m doing what I love.”
The good vibes at Ryle are mutual. Coach Ruschell is the Raiders gift that keeps on giving. From leg-riding and shot defense to scrambles and high-level attacks and finishes, Ryle wrestlers know it all because their coach is a wrestling know-it-all.
“We have a great coach and great wrestlers,” said Ryle junior Rider Trumble. “I think we have a solid, all-around team this year.”
As good as the Raiders may be, toppling state favorites Union County and Paducah Tilghman will once again be a chore as Saturday’s events partly demonstrated. Paducah Tilghman, ranked No. 4 at Kentuckywrestling.com, was not at the Raider Rumble. Top-ranked Union County was there and the Braves made a statement. They’re back in the discussion for state supremacy with a dominating performance while totaling 410 points, good for a 36-point margin over runner-up Ohio powerhouse Lebanon (374 points).
“Union County is tough, and they were missing three guys,” coach Ruschell said. “I would expect them to be a state favorite.”
Cincinnati Elder (363) finished third at the Rumble followed by fourth-place Ryle (299). The host was closely followed by Indiana power East Central (290) in fifth place, Dayton, Ohio-area power Beavercreek (289) in sixth and Cincinnati Taylor (288) in seventh. Tops among the other Northern Kentucky schools were 12th-place Conner (203.5), 13th-place Campbell County (183) and 15th-place Walton-Verona (173). Walton-Verona is ranked 15th in Kentucky, Conner 17th.
“A very strong field,” said Ruschell, the 2005 Kentucky wrestling coach of the year. “Many state placers and champs and state qualifiers in this tournament. It’s the toughest in the state.”
Right out of the gate.
“I like to take a look at where my team is at,” said coach Ruschell, who sees no need to dilly-dally with the early evaluation process. “We get a good look at Union County, too. They are the real deal this year.”
And so is the Raiders’ Rider Trumble, who rode roughshod at the Rumble. Trumble dominated Saturday’s competition by waylaying his weight class in short order. Trumble won all five matches and took the 150-pound championship with a pin of Covington Catholic runner-up Keegan Bishop in less than a minute. The Ryle junior was named the meet’s most outstanding wrestler.
Trumble wrestled at 132 pounds last season and won the regional crown, but did not place at the state meet after placing fifth at state as a freshman and fifth as an eighth grader.
“He wants to get back there and win it,” Ruschell said. “He’s real solid. He’s strong and long. He’s getting better on his feet.”
Trumble said he feels a lot more comfortable with 18 pounds added to his frame. That sense of comfortability showed up on Saturday, putting Trumble’s opponents in a familiar spot, on the losing end.
“I feel a lot better at this weight,” said Trumble, who finished with a 36-4 record last season. “I feel a lot stronger.”
Ryle’s other top finishers Saturday included third-placers Landon Evans at 126 pounds, Seth Page at 132 pounds and Travis Steiber at 190. Evans won last year’s state title at 113 pounds and finished 42-3. Coming up with fourth-place Rumble finishes were Luke Cornwell at 106 pounds and Jagger Irvin at 138. Max Neumann placed sixth at 285 pounds. Hunter Schimming finished seventh at 144. Dempsey Bain was eighth at 165.
Evans is ranked second in Kentucky at 126. Steiber is ranked fourth statewide. Page is ranked fifth in the state. Trumble and Cornwell are ranked sixth. Caleb Duke is ranked fifth at 165 pounds. That’s six Ryle wrestlers among the state’s top six.
Ryle won Friday’s JV Rumble and earned six first-place finishes. Winners were Bryant Brinkman (106), Reed Cornwell (144), Keigan Reisenbrock (165), Anthony Kemper (175), Beau Faul (215) and Max Neumann (285). The Raiders’ Victoria Emelianova placed fourth at 190 pounds. The is the first season for KHSAA-sanctioned girls wrestling.
With all that talent in the pipeline, the future looks good for wrestling at Ryle. Coach Ruschell would have it no other way. When it comes to Raider wrestling, the Ruschells are all in.
Even the coach’s wife, Pam, has aided in various ways with the program by helping her husband stay focused and by volunteering and helping organize certain Raiders activities, while raising their four children, including one daughter.
“Wrestling,” coach Ruschell said, “is in our blood.”