Youthful leader has had seven state champions
Cape coach Chris Mattioni gives his wrestler instructions during a match in the 2014 state tournament. NICK ROTH PHOTO
Dave Frederick December 24, 2020
Chris Mattioni rolled off Route 1 and Kings Highway into a job interview at Cape Henlopen in the summer of 1995, securing a social studies position sweetened by being named head coach of the wrestling team. Mattioni had wrestled at Valley Forge Military Academy and The Citadel, then spent two years coaching at Stanford High School in Goose Creek, S.C. He is not a stiff and buttoned-up personality who prefers to be called sir, but more the gracious, loquacious and affable teacher-coach type guy.