Noble pursuit: Father passed passion for wrestling to Warren’s defending state champ

There's a basic, logical, often-ignored rule of sports:

Every exciting victory is also an excruciating loss.

From a reporting perspective, it makes sense to celebrate the winners and respect broken hearts in the losing locker room. At the high school level, that's often where the story ends. The spotlight moves onto the next class.

Well, here's a redemption story that spans more than 30 years and two generations.

Last year, Warren freshman wrestler Caleb Noble captured the state championship at 106 pounds. He has a tough road but will try to win a second title at 113 pounds next weekend in Champaign. Noble (40-2) rolled to the sectional title at Barrington on Saturday.

His father, Derrick, has a similar story, with a very different ending. Wrestling for Carmel, Derrick Noble reached the 112-pound final as a junior in 1992 but lost in triple overtime to two-time state champ Mike Renella of Naperville North.

The next year's ending was even worse. Undefeated heading into the state tournament, Derrick came down with mononucleosis just before the event, lost twice on the final day, finished fourth and spent that night in the hospital.

Life doesn't just fast forward 30 years. Derrick had to deal with the disappointing endings of his high school wrestling days and admits it wasn't easy.

“It took me almost 15 years after my high school career was over for me to accept the amount of work, the level of work and how hard I was willing to work just was not good enough to be the best,” he said.

Chasing a championship

Derrick Noble didn't have an easy path growing up. He was in second grade when his father was sent to prison. He had a stepfather who introduced him to wrestling but wasn't always nearby. Derrick and his mother moved back and forth from Northeast Ohio to North Chicago a few times, with his mom working two jobs to send him to Carmel.

Derrick described his high school routine. Every night, he'd run 4 to 5 miles down Lewis Avenue to the naval base, turn around, hop the fence at North Chicago's football stadium, run eight laps around the track, do a few hundred pushups, then jog home.

“When I got back to the apartment building, there was always Gatorade sitting there, always something there,” Noble said. “There were letters in the bag. There was just huge community support, because they saw someone who just wanted to be somebody.”

That's also one of the things that haunted Noble about high school wrestling. It seems silly, but how many of us can even begin to relate to this level of dedication?

“The night before we left to go downstate (in '92), I didn't do my last run,” Noble said. “I went and had a milkshake and fries with a friend, and I skipped my last run. So in my head, that's the only reason.

“I did everything else that I was supposed to do to have enough technical, mental and spiritual to be a state champion. And I skipped my last run.”

Derrick wrestled in college at Illinois State, then kept his passion for the sport alive by moving into coaching. He's spent roughly the last 15 years leading Toss Em Up Academy in Waukegan, a nationally renowned wrestling club. His program has sent dozens of area wrestlers downstate.

He says the mats are open five days a week, year round. He doesn't take days off.

Carbon copy

People joke about how Caleb Noble is more of a clone than just the son of Derrick. To a reporter who covered that championship loss in 1992, the resemblance is uncanny.

“You look at my Facebook profile picture, everyone thinks that's Caleb, but that's me,” Derrick said. “The apple don't fall far from the tree.”

Derrick has four kids, two boys and two girls. All of them wrestled. Older son Kyree went to JUCO nationals with Harper College and serves as an extra coach for his younger brother.

“I started wrestling when I was 3. I was still in diapers,” Caleb said. “I just kind of grew up on it. I always trained with the high school guys when I was young. I just had a passion for it.”

He hasn't made a national team yet, but Caleb won the prestigious Super 32 tournament in North Carolina last October, then went to Ohio to win a loaded Ironman tourney in December.

The 113-pound class is likely the toughest in Illinois, though, because it has two wrestlers ranked top-10 nationally, Noble and Sandburg's Rocco Hayes.

“I think I could do a lot better,” Caleb said. “I gave up some unnecessary losses, having little brain tweaks here and there. Those are frustrating a little bit. Everything else, Ironman, Super 32, everything's going well, I feel like.”

Looking ahead, Caleb is planning to wrestle in college and make a good run at the 2028 Olympics. The ultimate goal, he says, is to make his mark as an MMA fighter.

In many ways, this is a perfect storm. Derrick passed along the limited mistakes of his past, spent some time perfecting his coaching style, while Kyree, 27, is now an ideal training partner for Caleb. One difference between father and son is Caleb likes to do his 5-mile runs through the neighborhood in the morning.

Sports parent can be a stressful job, but it's also rewarding, especially to someone scarred by athletic heartbreak.

“If my path was any different, then I wouldn't have what I have,” Derrick said. “This (success) makes it all feel better, I promise you that.”