Improvement from meet one to meet two impressive for Medford
MEDFORD WRESTLING
The new wrestling season got off to a rough start last Thursday for the Medford Raiders, but two days later, they showed why head coach Brandon Marcis is excited about what his young group can accomplish.
Medford went 2-3 Saturday with Division 1 squads at the Wausau West Warrior Duals and very nearly went 3-2. The most important thing for Marcis was that the Raiders needed just one practice to tighten up issues that showed up in Thursday’s 53-24 loss at the Neillsville Co-op.
“When we look at Neillsville, we got outscored in the second and third period really bad,” Marcis said. “So Friday that was a focus of ours, finishing matches. Saturday at West, almost every dual we wrestled in we outscored our opponents in the second and third periods. We made youth wrestling mistakes at Neillsville. It was the first dual. I’ve got basically 10 kids that are wrestling in their first full high school wrestling season, so we came out there and we make our youth wrestling mistakes. Our head is down on the mat. We don’t move on the bottom. So on Friday, we go work on those things and Saturday, we’re better at them. We fixed them.
“I think we’re getting better faster than we ever have. We have a ton of promise and potential. It’s so cool to see.”
Medford victories at West were a 52-24 rout of Stevens Point and a 49-27 victory over Sauk Prairie.
The Raiders won eight of 12 contested matches against Point and added a forfeit. Seven wins came with pins.
Thaddeus Sigmund, who has started the year 6-0, pinned Hunter Prisk in 16 seconds in the 113-pound bout, Jude Stark needed just 1:19 to pin Jacob Roberts at 126 pounds, Gage Losiewicz stuck Mason Jelinski in 3:00 at 138 pounds and Cory Lindahl got Riley Manteinach at the 1:00 mark at 145 pounds.
Oscar Hinderliter got a quick pin at 160 pounds. He defeated Kale Roth in 29 seconds. At 182 pounds, Logan Kawa pinned Mason Wierzba in 49 seconds and Braxton Weissmiller, bumping up to 285 pounds, stuck Josh Woznicki in just 26 seconds.
Freshman Parker Lissner got a 15-3 major decision over Riley Konkol at 132 pounds and Wyatt Johnson took the forfeit at 195 pounds.
Stevens Point got its four wins by pin. Cam Mayek got Rylan Zoellick in 1:24 at 106 pounds, Logan Seavers pinned Matt Gebert in 1:14 at 120 pounds, Kale Roth defeated Evan Wilkins in 1:05 at 152 pounds and Connor Seavers needed just 20 seconds to beat Raider Dalton Waide at 170 pounds.
Gebert was one of Medford’s key finishers against Sauk Prairie, capping his pin over David Kingsley with one second left in the 120-pound match. Stark, who is 5-1, followed with a 27-second pin of Chase Urban. Hinderliter stuck Xavier Sotero-Garcia in 1:57 at 160 pounds, Kawa needed 1:34 to defeat Talan Hatfield at 182 and Johnson pinned Blake Bermudez in 1:24 at 195 pounds. Zoellick and Sigmund took forfeits.
Wilkins earned a solid 8-0 major decision over Scott Graves and Lissner outlasted Austin Lankey for a 4-0 decision.
Losiewicz, who is 5-1, suffered his first loss of the year in a close 3-2 decision to Colton Uselman at 138 pounds. Dylan Breunig pinned Lindahl in 5:26, Grant Sorg pinned Waide in 58 seconds and Jack Tarnutzer pinned Weissmiller in 1:16 in the 220-pound match. Medford forfeited to Nolan Vils at 285.
The most exciting dual of the day was a 37-36 loss to Tomah that went down to the last match. Stark got Medford off to a good start at 126 pounds, pinning Caleb Pollack in 3:13. After Gavin Finch pinned Lissner in 1:11, Losiewicz pinned Benny Bemis in 4:36 and Lindahl came through with a big pin over Kaleb Rose.
Tomah came back with five wins in six matches. Logan Boulton beat Wilkins 8-0 at 152 pounds, Tanner Griffin beat Hinderliter 7-3, Dalton Johnson pinned Waide and Brady Lehnherr won a good match with Kawa at 182 pounds 4-2. Johnson stopped the Timberwolves’ run with a pin over Tanner Matthias in the 195-pound match, but Ethan Burch got Weissmiller in 1:01 and Harley Antone took a forfeit at 285 pounds.
Zoellick took a forfeit for Medford at 106 pounds and Sigmund pinned Jacob Van Hoof in 3:24. Tomah’s Cameron Finch clinched the win for his team with an 8-2 decision over Gebert at 120 pounds.
Marcis said he was pleased with the Raiders’ effort in a 42-27 loss to host Wausau West.
“It was a competitive dual,” he said. “They just have some huge, older, big kids. We just had too many gaps compared to their lineup.”
Hinderliter won an exciting, highscoring 160-pound match with Reed Napiwocki 13-10. Medford got four wins by pin. Sigmund stuck Ashley Danielson in 1:45, Gebert defeated his opponent in 1:20, Stark needed just 40 seconds against Chi Meng Xiong and Losiewicz pinned Gavin Lange in 5:07.
At 182 pounds, Joseph Berens edged Kawa 2-0 and Kayden Heisler shut out Wilkins 4-0 at 152 pounds. Zoellick, Lissner, Lindahl, Waide, Johnson and Weissmiller all lost by pin.
Pulaski, who went 5-0 on the day, defeated Medford 54-15. Kawa pinned Kayden Anderson in 1:36 in the 182-pound match, while Sigmund was a 4-3 winner over Ashton Kapla with a third-period reversal, Stark got a first-period takedown and second-period reversal to beat Connor Nooyen 4-1 and Losiewicz rode an early takedown and two reversals to a 6-2 win over Ryan Frewerd.
Cole Gorecki got by Wilkins 7-2 and Caden Rybicki was an 8-6 winner over Hinderliter. Zoellick, Gebert, Lissner, Lindahl, Waide, Johnson and Weissmiller were all pinned.
“Our goal is to be the best in the state and that’s why we get the best schedule we can find,” Marcis said. “That’s why we went and did five duals with good Division 1 competition. We responded well. Even the matches we lost, every one was a dogfight. We were in it. We were battling with head and hands defense. We kept trying to score. Our conditioning was decent. We’re going to keep getting better at it. But I thought overall, I was pretty happy with our performance.”
Medford is back on the mat tonight, Thursday, hosting Stanley-Boyd at Raider Hall for the home opener. Varsity action is set to start at 7 p.m. Medford will compete in the Eau Claire North Invitational on Saturday before hosting Toma- hawk Dec. 16 in a big Great Northern Conference opener.
First loss
Medford got three pins Thursday, but that wasn’t nearly enough in the 53-24 season-opening loss in Neillsville.
The host co-op won 10 matches, including six pins and a forfeit, and added two major decisions.
“We talk about sometimes we’re going to be in a dogfight against someone who is a little bit better technically or a little bit more physically mature,” Marcis said. “Those are our greatest opportunities to improve and get better and work on little things.”
Sigmund got one of the pins, sticking Ethan Buchanan in 1:22 at 113 pounds. Lissner and Losiewicz started their highschool careers with back-to-back pins at 132 and 138 pounds. Lissner got Rogan Ashbeck in 3:39 and Losiewicz got his pin at 4:40 over Jarick Young. Zoellick won by forfeit at 106.
Kawa had the closest match in Medford’s losses, falling 3-0 to Carter Schoengarth at 182 pounds. Derek Zschernitz downed Gebert 10-1 at 120 pounds and Garrett Learman defeated Raider Blake Schilling 10-2 at 160 pounds.
Luke Dux pinned Stark in 1:51, Keeghan Anding pinned Lindahl in 3:48, Jayme Zvolena pinned Wilkins in 46 seconds, Dane Luchterhand pinned Hinderin liter in 4:27 at 170 pounds, Damian Sampson pinned Medford’s Tripp Reamer in 1:39 at 195 pounds and Dan Polzin pinned Weissmiller in 1:37 at 220. Gunner Hoffman received a forfeit for Neillsville at 285.
“If they listen and improve the rest of the season like we did this past week, teams better watch out,” Marcis said. “We talk about living your whole entire life the best you can. You can’t perform your best on the mat if you’re not getting the job done off the mat. We have 14 weight classes to fill. That means everyone has to be healthy, everyone needs to be eligible. Everyone needs to be in it for the team. That’s one thing I can tell about these guys. They’re genuinely having fun together and I think that they think about that when they approach their life outside of wrestling.”
Jude Stark
The 2021-22 Wolfpack wrestling team includes (l. to r.) coach Justin Fredrickson, Preston Fredrickson, Troy Duellman, Braeden Person, Ali Blodgett and head coach Greg Sonnentag. Julian Krizan is not pictured.GINNA YOUNG/THE COURIER SENTINEL
