The strides James Syracuse made on the mat were easy to see.

Syracuse enjoyed the best season of his career this winter, placing third at districts in Class 3A and advancing to regionals for the first time.

The path to get there put the Pleasant Valley senior on the map.

It also reaffirmed his commitment to the sport and dedication to the Bears’ program.

“It’s been an incredible experience just getting to know James,” said first-year Pleasant Valley head coach Alex Depew. “He came into the room weighing 200 pounds, and I was chomping at the bit for that. I’m a bigger guy, and James immediately took to my style of wrestling. His workout partner the entire year was myself and the other coaches. It gets really personal, it gets emotional because you see the work he’s put in every single day.

“For him to work out with high level guys and understand that he can also be at that level ... James bought in quickly once he started seeing results, once he started beating some better guys that, maybe on paper, he wasn’t supposed to beat, but we saw the ability in the room, and it was contagious. Every time James won a match, he wanted to score more points.”

Syracuse won a lot, and did so in impressive fashion. Twenty of his 30 victories came by pin this season.

Syracuse suffered just five losses, and was pinned only once. That setback came at districts against undefeated and eventual state champ Sonny Sasso of Nazareth.

It was a banner season for a multisport athlete and Times News/Lehigh Valley Health Network Wrestler of the Year, one who was initially unsure if he would be on the mat this winter.

“Coming into the season, I knew I was getting knee surgery after football,” said Syracuse, who will study mechanical engineering at Penn State University. “And at that point, we didn’t have a head coach hired, and I wasn’t 100% sure I was even going to wrestle this year. I didn’t want to walk away from my other coaches, but I figured if I had to take one sport off to get surgery - although wrestling was my most successful sport - I didn’t really know what I was going to do because I had a lot of friends on football, a lot of friends on baseball, and it was just the fact of the matter that I didn’t want to walk out on any coach I had, so if I didn’t have a coach, it might be best if I didn’t wrestle and took the season off and finally get my knee surgery.

“That decision didn’t last very long. I got cleared much sooner than I expected after surgery (following football season); it was only like a two-, three-week thing and I was back. After I met head coach Depew and the coaching staff, I knew there was no way I wasn’t wrestling.”

Syracuse dislocated his kneecap going into his sophomore year of football. It’s an injury that he’s learned to manage throughout his career, though one he’s also deemed an annoyance.

With a slow build leading into the season before he was cleared, Syracuse did as much as he could to prepare while his coaches made sure not to overwork him.

It didn’t take Syracuse long to get his footing, winning five of his first six matches by fall, with the other coming by forfeit. He ripped off three first-period pins on his way to the South Williamsport title at 189 pounds in early January.

That dominance continued throughout the year, and Syracuse entered the postseason with a 24-2 record - with the losses coming by a combined four points - and as the fifth seed for districts at 189 pounds.

Syracuse went out with a bang, pinning Whitehall’s Melquan Warren to take third place for his first district medal.

It was another shining moment for both Syracuse and the program.

“He just continued to improve, he continued to be coachable and buy in,” said Depew. “To the point where he didn’t want to leave the room. He wanted to stay a little longer. He wanted to keep rolling and keep grinding.”

Syracuse was primed to make a run to Hershey in the consolation rounds of the Northeast Regional 3A tournament the following week before a recurrence of his knee injury during the second period of his third-round consolation match against Nate Porter of Roman Catholic.

Syracuse led 2-1 at the time of the injury, and debated whether he could continue during nearly a minute of injury time. He gave it his all - despite struggling to stand - but wasn’t able to defend on one leg, ultimately falling 5-2.

Though the loss marked the end of his wrestling career, it was another example of what Syracuse is about - on and off the mat.

“It’s a metaphor for life,” said Depew. “Sometimes things aren’t going to go your way. And you put in all the work, they’re still not going to go your way. You might be the most qualified for the job, you might still not get it. For a guy like James, experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want. I think this entire season was something that he’s going to look back on and be very proud of, and realize that maybe it didn’t go his way, but that it’s going to set him up for success in other facets of life.”