Good athlete, great name

He’s old enough to be my son, so it was a natural question.

“Are you Greg Lee Jr.?” the P.E. teacher asked the Coeur d’Alene High School student.

So there I was Monday afternoon exchanging salutations with the other Greg Lee in town. I’ve watched the three-sport athlete, now a junior, run and wrestle before. But I purposely delayed introducing myself for such a time as this.

“Everyone asks me if you’re my dad,” he said.

Imagine my shock – which quickly transitioned to delight – when he said Robert E. Lee is in his family tree. My family discovered a number of years ago that the famous Civil War general is in our family tree.

Being the trained reporter that I am, I interrupted our interview to share the news bulletin with S-R photographer Kathy Plonka. I restrained from pulling out my cell phone and calling mom.

“You know, he looks like Sean,” Kathy said of my sixth-grade son.

So while the link is thin at best, we’re related.

While the name Greg Lee might not be as common as, say, John Smith, I was astonished at the multiple hits I found when I did an Internet search. I came across the Greg Lee that I’m most familiar with – a boyhood hero who played basketball for John Wooden in the early 1970s at UCLA. During my elementary-age years, I remember watching on the old Magnavox the All-American guard lobbing the ball down low to Bill Walton. What I didn’t know until this week, however, is that Greg Lee and I also share the same full name – Gregory Scott Lee.

Too surreal. But I digress. This is about Gregory Raymond Lee, who helped the Viking cross country team, which returns intact next year, to sixth at state last fall and hopes to help the wrestling team capture a trophy at state later this month.

A glance at the accompanying picture shows the disparity in our physical dimensions. He’s a 100-pound wrestler competing in his sport’s lightest class at 103. If I were a wrestler I’d be a heavyweight – well less than the maximum limit of 275, mind you, but slightly double my new friend’s weight. He’s 5-foot-2 and I’m 10 inches taller.

Lee does two things I never considered in my teen years. Run? The only running I do these days is to the refrigerator – and only if my kids aren’t around to attend to my needs. Wrestle? The closest I come to rasslin’ is for the remote control or when there’s one piece of fried chicken or pizza remaining.

He didn’t wrestle prior to high school. He wasn’t planning on it until a persistent coach convinced him to turn out.

“The only reason I went out for wrestling is that (coach Jeff) Moffat kept hounding me,” Lee said.

So a month after the season started, he turned out. To his surprise, he qualified for state.

He had another delayed start last year because of a season-ending injury he suffered in cross country.

Lee was nearing the end of the race at the Farragut Invitational when he felt sharp pain in his right hip. But he tried to fight his way through it – you know that mental toughness stuff – when the muscle attached to his hip ripped away from the bone as he trudged up infamous Goat Hill. His lengthy recovery included a month in a wheelchair.

“I turned out for wrestling after Christmas, but I was still really nervous about my hip,” he said. “I think I was timid.”

He finished third at the state-qualifying meet, missing a return to state by one place. He reinjured his hip a couple of months later in track. Fearing he might have been overtraining while trying to build a mileage foundation, he rested his hip last summer. The result was his first injury-free cross country season. He finished 45th out of 66 at state, and his goal next year, when he will be the team captain for a fourth year, is to finish in the top 20 (which would earn a medal) and help the Vikings capture a team trophy.

To that end, he hopes to log 500 miles running this summer.

“I plan to train wisely and listen to my body,” he said.

He will be favored to win a title at the regional wrestling tourney in three weeks.

“My goal for state is sixth,” he said. The top six take home medals.

His perseverance has impressed Moffat.

“He works extremely hard,” Moffat said. “He was a rookie to the sport as a freshman. His technique is a lot better now. He does everything we ask in the practice room. As a coach, if you had 10 Greg Lees you’d be in business.”

If this Greg Lee ever has an opportunity to meet another Greg Lee like I did this week, I trust the experience proves to be as inspirational for him as it was for me.