It’s not all that unusual for siblings to play together on youth sports teams. It’s not completely unusual to see them compete at the high school level together on the same squads.

 

Heck, it even happens – at a much rarer pace – in college. You can’t watch a West Virginia University football contest without the announcers mentioning Dante and Darius Stills from Fairmont Senior. It’s mentioned, because although not unusual, it is a far less common occurrence.

 

Bridgeport High School recently had the same situation. In fact, it just ended on the cross country circuit at Wheeling Jesuit University. On Nov. 17, Michael and Mark Duez ran their final race together as members of the Cardinals Cross Country team.

 

The pair were among the representatives for WJU at the 2018 NCAA Division II Atlantic Regional Championships that day. The event, hosted by Slippery Rock University, was held at the Bob O’Connor Golf Course at Schenley Park in Pittsburgh.

 

Although neither the team nor the pair qualified for the national event, the fact they helped Wheeling Jesuit get there was a great way to cap off Michael Duez’s career and propel Mark Duez’s running tenure for his sophomore campaign.

“I guess I knew it was my last race, but I think back about how much I really enjoyed my time with the team more than anything else,” said Duez. “It’s a tight knit group that does everything together from Fantasy Football to talking about sports and arguing over everything to prove who’s right. In a lot of ways it was similar to cross country at Bridgeport,” said Michael. “I wouldn’t trade any of it.”

 

Michael will likely graduate this coming May with a degree in Business Administration that focuses on marketing. Although he’s considered a redshirt junior, his running career is over. Partially due to graduation, and partially due to injury.

 

The oldest of the Duez boys suffers from a condition known as femoroacetabular impingement. It’s not only difficult to pronounce, it makes it difficult to run.

 

In layman’s terms, where the socket in Michael’s leg meets his hip, there’s extra bone. The extra bone causes the pelvis to create issues with the spine and that, in turn, causes sometimes more than just annoying pain in his back and legs. He’s battled it throughout his college career.

 

“I’d be lying if I said the past three years haven’t been frustrating. When it’s good, I can run, but when it’s been bad it’s pretty bad. I guess I should be thankful, and I am, that I’ve still been able to run because every time I started feeling like I would get up to par it would bother me again and I’d be back to square one,” said Michael, a 2015 graduate from BHS.

 

Because of that, Michael’s times never advanced to where he thought they should be or where he wanted them to be. In the end, however, he wasn’t complaining too much about the situation. He’s still happy that he’s spending time at WJU and happy that his brother is there with him.

 

The reunion at Wheeling almost never happened. Coming out of high school, Michael Duez signed to run with West Virginia Wesleyan.

 

“I just wasn’t as happy there and my running wasn’t going great. I had a girlfriend at the time at Jesuit so I went up there and visited and ended up getting to know a lot of the guys and having a good time up there,” said Michael. “It just seemed to fit better and I decided that’s where I should be.”

 

And that’s where he went. Eventually, his brother would join him after Mark ended up making several visits to spend time with him and fell in love with the school as well.

 

“Having him there was big in my decision-making process because he talked about it a lot when he was home,” said Mark. “Then when I went to visit up there it was exactly like he said it was. Not that I had any reason not to believe him, but I knew if he was right about how much fun the school was that he was telling me the truth about the cross country program and the school itself. Your brother is someone you can trust and he had the experience and that’s a big reason I came here.”

 

While Michael told Mark about WJU, he didn’t pressure him. Instead, he just told him his thoughts and everything fell into place during those visits.

 

“Whenever I was home, I’d tell him where he should go. The truth was, as much as I wanted him to go to Wheeling, he knew I wanted him to make his decision for himself,” said Michael. “I’m glad he came, but I would have been happy to see him have a chance to run if it was at Wesleyan, Concord or Charleston.

 

“I think those visits were the big turning point because he knew he was coming to a place where he knew a lot of people and what to expect,” Michael continued. “Heck, it got to the point where he was hanging out with some of my friends more than I was.”

 

Mark echoed what his big brother had to say regarding trips to the panhandle.

 

“I met most of the guys on those visits and became friends with them … I’m still friends with them,” said Mark, a 2018 BHS graduate. “I liked so much about the school, but having already built friendships meant I wouldn’t have to lean on Michael to adjust socially. That issue was gone before I ever became an official student there.”

 

Once there, Mark Duez began to cut his own path in cross country. Unlike his brother, Mark was pretty healthy the entire season.

 

“It was pretty awesome to see him come in and step up immediately as a freshman … What was funny was I remember beating him and being better, but he’s gotten better now,” said Michael, who said he’s still considering surgery for his hip, likely after track season for WJU. “It was still great to work out with him and run with him. I’m still the big brother so you do the big brother things like picking on him, but I think this worked out pretty good for both of us.”

 

While Michael was happy to see his younger brother excel at cross country, Mark was happy to see his older brother just to be able to run. Considering his condition, that wasn’t a given and Mark knew it.

 

“It was special, first off, to see him be able to run a full season because I know what he’s going through. I already know that unless something major happens to me is that if he can run every meet then I should be able to do the same through my senior year,” said Mark. “The other reason it was special is that we only got to run together in cross country one time in high school. This year, we ran every race together so next year’s going to be a bit different.”

 

While Mark will keep on running and studying chemistry, Michael will likely be in graduate school – at West Virginia University if things goes as planned. He hopes to get a Master’s Degree in Business Administration.

 

“It’s hard to leave, but it’s all worked out. It’s been a good run,” said Michael, likely with no pun intended. “Hopefully Mark can do some special things at Jesuit over the next three years.”

 

If he does, he will at least partly have his big brother to thank for it.

 

Editor's Note: Top photo shows Michael Duez running for Wheeling Jesuit, while Mark Duez is shown running for the Cardinals in the second photo. In the third picture, Mark, left, and Michael, are shown with mother Michelle and father Matt at Micheal's final cross country meet. In the bottom photo, Mark, left, is shown with Michael in a rare instance of competing together while at Bridgeport High School.