Kraus, Pickerign win titles during Lakeland meet

Senior Sam Pickerign earned his second straight Lakeland Conference wrestling championship, while junior Spencer Kraus got his first while leading the Cornell-Gilman Wolfpack to a seventh-place finish at Saturday’s league tournament, hosted by the Wolfpack in Gilman.
Both wrestlers only had to win two matches to claim their titles. Reflecting the shrinking depth of many Lakeland Conference programs, the 10 teams combined to enter 74 wrestlers in the entire tournament and nine weight classes had just four or five wrestlers.
Pickerign’s 132-pound weight class featured one of the deepest fields with seven wrestlers. Pickerign (14-2) was the top seed and advanced straight to the semifinals, where he quickly pinned Cameron’s Aiden Torok (23-16) in 55 seconds. In the championship bout, Pickerign won a tight battle with junior Landyn Johnson of the Luck-Frederic-Grantsburg-Siren Co-op 3-1.
For the full story, pick up a copy of this week’s issue of The Star News.