The Beaufort High School wrestling team will be under the direction of a new head coach during the 2014-15 season. Longtime Beaufort High School wrestling head coach Bill Damude has stepped down. His assistant coach during the 2013-14 season, 24-year-old Travis Wynn — a 2008 state champion at Beaufort High and one of the state’s top young coaches — is expected to be named the new head coach. An official move on the job, however, hadn’t been made as of press time.

Wynn was the head coach of the Whale Branch Early College High School wrestling program in the 2012-13 season. He left Whale Branch to become Damude’s assistant coach at Beaufort High last school year.

Damude excelled throughout his coaching stint. SCmat.com lists Damude with 372 dual wins, which has him tied for eighth among the state’s coaches. During his coaching career, Damude coached 10 individual state champions. He also led Beaufort High to a runner-up finish in the Class 4-A tournament.

Among Damude’s other top grapplers at Beaufort High School were all-Americans Harris Lawton (1990) and Charles Barton (1993), whom he guided to senior nationals.

After high school, Wynn wrestled for the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, N.Y.

The Beaufort High wrestling team is poised to compete in Class 3-A.