Motivation typically isn’t an issue for the Camden Hills of Rockport high school wrestling team.

Six straight Class B state titles not only create high expectations, but also make the Windjammers a target for all who would replace them atop the championship ladder.

“Everyone hates Camden,” said sophomore Jacob Berry. “All the teams hate us, no one likes champions, so we’re working hard to get No. 1 again.”

This year’s team has even more motivation, the memory of a fallen teammate. Gilbert “Gibby” Bryant, who won the Eastern B title and placed third in the state meet at 215 pounds as a freshman last February, died suddenly on Nov. 4.

“I think it’s one more thing that makes us strive for a championship, because we know he would have wanted the same thing,” said senior Harry Pearson. “He was more than a teammate, he was a close friend of most of us on the team. It was definitely hard, but it gives us that extra push. If we’re ever down, we look up, and we know it’s not that bad and we can get through it.”

That Bryant’s death came 17 days before the start of preseason practices magnified its impact on his teammates, so a party of 12 wrestlers and coaches went to regroup at coach Patrick Kelly’s camp in Jackman. There they had a bonding experience that suggests Bryant will remain an important part of the program long beyond his last match.

They had just arrived and were getting the camp in order when Kelly turned on a radio. The first song they heard was “My Old Friend” by Tim McGraw, a song that also was played at Bryant’s memorial service.

“We were all scattered about, fire on the outside, fire on the inside, bringing in food and shoveling snow,” said Kelly. “It was typical camp mayhem. A month ago I was up there and the radio didn’t work because the batteries were dead, but apparently someone changed them, so when I flipped it on it was working. I tuned into a station at random, and that song was on. From the time I turned the radio on to the time that one country song finished, somehow everybody had come into the camp and was sitting down. Nobody was speaking to anybody, we all looked over to the radio and there it was.

“It was fairly convincing. Of all times and all places to be, a minute and a half later and we would have missed the song, but there it was. You think about it, and you just really wonder.”

“That far north, most of the stations are French,” added Pearson. “It was crazy, but we just showed up and all kind of waltzed into the room at the same time, and there was that song.”

Bryant remains firmly in the team’s collective memory these days as it goes about its business of pursuing a seventh straight state title – Camden Hills shared the crown with Mountain Valley of Rumford last season. But generally those emotions are internalized.

“I think we show good appreciation to him, but we’re not wearing it on the outside,” said junior Cody Laite. “Obviously he’s in our hearts and we think of him every day, but we don’t let it affect how we practice. If anything, it gives us a little more motivation.”

“We all cared and loved the Gibster, he was a very fun guy to be around,” Kelly added. “It’s not something you get over, it’s something you get through, and it’s a long process. “But these are mature young guys, well beyond their years in how they’ve handled this.”

Ernie Clark may be reached at 1-800-310-860, 990-8045 or eclark@bangordailynews.net.