In the summer prior to his sophomore season at McCallie school, Judah Duhm edged onto the national wrestling scene. Wrestling with Team Tennessee in Oklahoma in the national duals, he posted an 8-2 record.
Injuries, though, pushed him back to the periphery and there he remained until last spring. Duhm's return to national prominence didn't result from a 39-0 junior-season record or the championship medal from the 2016 Tennessee state tournament because they carry little weight beyond the state. It was instead a fifth-place finish at the national prep tournament.
The result is recruiting conversations with Navy, Army, Stanford and Virginia and interest from several others including the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and Cal-Poly, now coached by former UTC assistant Jon Sioredas.
Duhm won the 182-pound title in the McCallie Invitational, which finished Saturday afternoon, and the host Blue Tornado finished third in the team standings with 208 points. Union Grove was first with 235, and Woodland was second with 209.5. The other Chattanooga-area teams in the top 10 were Soddy-Daisy (sixth, 135) and Heritage (10th, 112.5).
Previously home-schooled, Duhm acknowledges that he learned discipline, focus and resolve after enrolling at McCallie as an eighth-grader.
"He's focused - blinders on - and he's a hard worker," McCallie coach Mike Newman assessed. "He's the first one at practice, and when you finish, send the team to the locker room, start the laundry and come back an hour later he's still in there working. Or you come in on a day you've given the guys off and he's there at 3 o'clock and still there at 6 o'clock."
Duhm becomes consumed with setting and meeting goals.
"He's obsessed whether it's academics or wrestling," Newman saod.
When he first entered McCallie, Duhm was a lost soul. He struggled academically and socially.
"I remember thinking, 'What's this changing classes and classrooms?' All my classes had been in one room," he said.
There was little pressure from home for academic excellence as his parents allowed him to adjust, he said. Quality grades, though, became a personal goal, and he now flirts with a 4.0 grade point average.
"I learned the process and got better. There's a big difference between home school and McCallie," he said.
A sport he didn't initially enjoy, wrestling was no different. Duhm recalled a youth coach once semi-seriously offering him all he had in his wallet if he'd draw blood during a practice.
"I didn't want to hurt anybody but I began to enjoy the physicality, and if you don't you're missing 80 percent of the sport," Duhm said.
There also is the independence brought about by the one-on-one where there's no one to make a pass or a block.
"I love going through the motions it takes to win. It's two people in an arena," Duhm said. "Your teammates are there supporting you, but they can't get out there and help you. It's your responsibility, and I want to go out there and do the job right. If you don't, you walk off the mat and then go figure out what you did wrong."
Duhm has spent years enhancing his will to win, but he credited Newman and other McCallie coaches (Gordon Connell, David Levitt and Jake Yost) for helping mold his technique and his mindset.
"A lot of my success is due to my coaches, along with the support from my dad and my family," he said. "My dad - even when I was hurt he always thought I was the best guy in the room."
And he wasn't far off.
Contact Ward Gossett at wgossett@timesfreepress.com or 423-886-4765. Follow him at Twitter.com/wardgossett.