Kiski Area grad Jared Curcio battles back from mono to win PAC wrestling title

If you think Craig Thurber, the highly driven wrestling coach at Thiel College, is just blowing smoke by calling Jared Curcio “a tough kid,” think again. If you suspect Curcio, the prosaic former Kiski Area athlete who continues to participate in football and wrestling for the Division III Tomcats, is impressed with an encouraging pat on the back, you’re mistaken.

Perhaps Thurber, a former three-time Division II All-American wrestler at Pitt-Johnstown, sees much of his relentless qualities in Curcio, who himself fancies success.

“I just think kids like Jared love to compete and work,” said Thurber, who won a PIAA championship at 171 pounds for Greenville in District 10 and went on to a successful college career at UPJ, where his 38 victories during the 1994-95 season remain a record at 177 pounds.

He is among the latest group of inductees into the UPJ Athletics Hall of Fame. His 120 career victories are tied for sixth on the school’s all-time wins list.

Earlier this month, with the help of Curcio, who was wrestling for the first time this year after missing the regular season with mononucleosis, Thiel claimed the school’s 24th Presidents’ Athletic Conference championship and second in a row.

“I was really sick for about two weeks. My conditioning and endurance wasn’t where they had been in the past, but I was ready enough,” Curcio said, acknowledging the lingering effects of an enlarged spleen, a result of the mono. “I know what the PAC championship means to the coaches and community.”

“Ready enough” that Curcio was among five Tomcats wrestlers to win individual titles. He decisioned Ayden Bishoff of Waynesburg, 6-4, in the 184-pound semifinals and Nick Funovits of Washington & Jefferson, 20-13, in the championship match.

“If Jared wasn’t in the lineup, we wouldn’t have won (the team title),” Thurber said. “He wasn’t really ready to come back, but he wanted to do our team a favor.”

Curcio, whose normal weight class is 197, was a fill-in for regular 184-pounder Bryce McCloskey, who was sidelined with a knee injury.

“I was kind of apprehensive, but he had been coming to practice,” Thurber said of Curcio. “He’s a tough kid, and he’s super talented.”

In the days leading up to the start of the NCAA Division III wrestling championships, Curcio had been planning to attend but not participate in the Southeast Regional over the weekend in York after qualifying at the PAC Tournament.

“We might go out and watch,” he was saying before the event. “My brother lives in Hershey.”

Vaughn Curcio, another former Kiski Area wrestler, teaches and coaches junior high wrestling in the Derry Township School District, near Hershey in Dauphin County.

“He’s always had a big impact role with me,” Jared Curcio said of his older brother, who wrestled at 138 pounds in high school.

Jared Curcio said their parents insisted that the kids emphasize the importance of academics. Jared, an early childhood and special education major at Thiel, currently carries a 4.0 grade point average.

Jared said he is trying to put the encounter with mono behind him as he prepares to resume workouts — lifting weights and conditioning — in advance of the 2023 spring football season. The 5-foot-11, 210-pound Curcio has played safety and linebacker for the Tomcats, whose lone victory last season ended a 41-game losing streak dating to 2017.

“We’ve got a couple of guys who play two sports,” Thurber said, “and I’m fine with it. I’m very open to it. They’re Division III kids. They don’t play on athletic scholarships.”

For Curcio, there is just the joy in working hard and competing. And that’s what Thurber respects most.