LEFT NO DOUBT
GNC WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS
Raiders cap dominant GNC wrestling season
Barring something disastrous, the Medford Raiders went into Saturday’s Great Northern Conference wrestling tournament knowing they were going to leave the Tomahawk Fieldhouse with the 2022-23 championship trophy.
The unknown was how sharp the Raiders would be after a two-week layoff since their last competition and also knowing momentum would be important with the WIAA Division 2 post-season set to begin this Saturday.
With six champions and four runners- up, the results spoke for themselves.
As the only team with a full lineup of 14 wrestlers, Medford cruised to the tournament title with 486 points, well ahead of Lakeland’s 344 and Tomahawk’s 258. Mosinee (219), Antigo (213) and Rhinelander (208) rounded out Saturday’s standings.
With the tournament win and a 5-0 dual-meet record, Medford wasn’t sharing this year’s title as it did the past two seasons with Tomahawk.
“For me it’s really, really big to win it because I’ve never won one before,” said junior Cory Lindahl, who won his first GNC title at 152 pounds. “But for the whole team, it just feels great. We’ve been chasing Tomahawk for a few years. In the tournament, they just barely beat us usually. This year we dominated everybody.”
“I would definitely agree with that,” said junior Jude Stark, who successfully defended his 126-pound title. “It’s really big just winning it for yourself, winning it for your team. It’s big placement wise. It helps your team out a lot. It feels good in that aspect. As a team, winning it, it’s a big deal. It’s what you’ve been working for for a long time as a team.”
The team’s senior leader, 120-pound champion Thaddeus Sigmund, emphasized the Raiders need to look at Saturday’s success as just the beginning.
“I feel like individually, it’s like a Level 1 post-season accomplishment because you go from conference to regionals and everything after that,” Sigmund said. “As a team you kinda just want to win conference. It shows you’re the best around.”
Gage Losiewicz, Parker Lissner and Owen Higgins joined those three as GNC champions. Logan Kawa, Paxton Rothmeier, Braxton Weissmiller and Max Dietzman are Medford’s secondteam award winners and Broden Schilling added a third-place honorable mention finish in a three-man bracket at 106 pounds.
The champs
Sigmund won his bracket for the third straight year. The 113-pound champion last year, Sigmund was the clear favorite at 120 pounds and he had little trouble with the other three entrants, pinning Tomahawk’s Walter Horabik in 54 seconds, Rhinelander’s Aiden Ostermann in 40 seconds and Mosinee’s George Ahles in 2:30 in the final. After a first-period takedown, Sigmund reversed Ahles to start the second period and carried the move all the way through to his pin.
“I felt like I started off really well,” Sigmund said. “I didn’t really get a lot of matches in, not a lot of wrestling time, but I still feel like I wrestled well enough to break into the day. In the finals match, I’d wrestled him before, he’s a super strong kid, but he gets caught in certain positions and I kind of just figured out how to read that throughout the season.”
Stark’s second straight GNC title also came in a four-man bracket. He started with Medford’s quickest pin of the day, 11 seconds, against Mosinee’s Ethan Colden.
“He was front heavy and I just snapped him down,” Stark said. “There wasn’t much to it.”
Stark pinned Rhinelander’s Kyle Wiese in 1:14 and finished with a solid match against one of Lakeland’s better wrestlers, Ashton Bremer, pinning him in 5:14 after building a 12-0 lead.
“I pinned him earlier in the season in about 30 seconds, just caught him,” Stark said of Bremer. “I didn’t know how he was going to wrestle this time. I went out there, he gave it his all, I gave it my all. I just ended up on top and ended up getting him.”
Losiewicz, a sophomore, followed up last year’s 138-pound title with the 145-pound championship this year. In another four-man bracket, Losiewicz pinned Tomahawk’s Andrew Tollefson in 1:31, controlled his match with Lakeland’s Jerome LaBarge in a 12-3 major decision and finished with a 15-0 technical fall over Antigo’s Jason Arrowood that was clinched as time expired. Arrowhead hung tough early, getting to the second period at 0-0, but then Losiewicz took over.
Sophomore Owen Higgins captured his second straight title as well. Last year’s 120-pound champion, Higgins won the 132-pound crown Saturday, winning a tough battle with a frequent rival, Tomahawk’s Addison Peissig, 2-0 in the final. A second-period reversal was the only scoring. Before that, Higgins had no trouble, pinning Rhinelander’s Cyrus Leisure in 38 seconds and Mosinee’s Noah Nechuta in 30 seconds.
Lindahl and Lissner are first-time GNC champions.
Lissner won the 138-pound championship with a 3-0 day that started with a 50-second pin over Mosinee’s Jack Schippers and a pin in 3:28 in a competitive match with Rhinelander’s Dresden Klaver. It was 3-2 when Lissner got the takedown that led to the second-period pin. In his title bout, Lissner was challenged by Tomahawk’s Ryan Larson. Larson’s takedown late in the first period tied the match at 4-4, but Lissner started the second period with a near fall and, after Larson escaped, Lissner caught him and pinned him at 3:57.
Lindahl had one of his best days of the season while dominating the fiveman 152-pound weight class. He pinned Antigo’s Levi Binversie in 50 seconds, dominated Mosinee’s Oliver Janssen in a 13-1 major decision and pinned Lakeland’s Tyson Skubal to set up a championship match with Tomahawk’s Hudson Mattke. He needed just 46 seconds to get the pin.
“I beat him earlier in the season so I felt like I kinda had him beat mentally already,” Lindahl said. “I was just telling myself I know I’ve beaten him before. I have to give it my all and then I went out there and just did what I normally do and I really got into him.”
More success
Medford’s run of six straight championship wins ended at 160 pounds in a tight, defensive battle between Kawa and Lakeland’s Zane Grams. Kawa beat Grams in the Jan. 20 dual meet, but this time Grams edged Kawa 2-1 to earn his second straight GNC championship. There was only one other wrestler in the weight class. Kawa was a 6-0 winner over Antigo’s Nolan Kielcheski, who Grams pinned in 3:52.
Rothmeier, last year’s 132-pound championship, bumped way up to 170 pounds this year and nearly won another title. In a full six-man bracket, Rothmeier won his first four bouts, pinning Tomahawk’s Kaiden Kapallusch in 1:50, Lakeland’s Tommy Howard in 3:32 and Mosinee’s Bruce Hintz in 4:23 while also getting a 14-5 major decision over Rhinelander’s Logan Schwinger. That set up a winner-take-all match with Antigo’s Robby Hagerty, who pulled away late for a 14-7 win.
Junior Braxton Weissmiller earned his highest GNC finish. Wrestling at 220 pounds, Weissmiller was on top of his game in his first three matches. He pinned Antigo’s Caleb Vandenlangenberg in 51 seconds and Tomahawk’s Nathen Norman, also in 51 seconds to start his day. His most impressive match was his third one. Tied 2-2 going into the second period against Mosinee’s Teryn Walls, who dropped down from 285 pounds for this meet, Weissmiller rode Walls to start the period and physically dominated him, getting two near falls before pinning him at 3:21. Weissmiller hoped to avenge a loss by pin last month to Lakeland’s Landon Saglin in the final, but Saglin outscored him 8-3 to win his first GNC title. Dietzman was in a three-man 285-pound bracket and pinned Lakeland’s Esaube Brown in 1:47 before falling to Rhinelander’s top wrestler, Owen Kurtz in an exciting overtime final. Dietzman got a late escape to tie the match at 1-1, but Kurtz caught him in the one-minute, sudden-victory period with a five-point move to take the match 6-1. At 106 pounds, Schilling lost both of his matches by pin to champion Presley Gutbrod of Tomahawk and Logan Gray-Ives of Lakeland. Nick Malchow went 1-4 to place fifth at 113 pounds. His win came in his last match in a back-and-forth battle with Antigo’s Aidan Kielcheski. Malchow led 4-2 after one period, fell behind 10-6 in the second before getting a late reversal. After drawing within one after a locked hands violation on Kielcheski, Malchow took his shot and connected, getting the pin at 4:36.
Sophomore Evan Wilkins went 2-2 in a tough, five-man bracket at 182 pounds and came out on the short end of a threeway tie for second place and wound up fourth. He edged Jose Retana of Lakeland 6-5 in his second match of the day and followed that up with a pin in 4:50 over Rhinelander’s Joseph Evenson. Wilkins was pinned in 1:10 by champion Samson Smith of Antigo and lost a hard-fought 7-3 decision to Mosinee’s Andrew Nevienski. Retana pinned Nevienski, creating the three-way tie and his pin gave him second place.
Jonathan Bartnik was 0-3 in his contested matches and finished fourth at 195 pounds. In his best match, he took Tomahawk’s Blake Younker into the second period before falling in 3:19.
On to Osceola
The WIAA post-season begins Saturday with the Division 2 super regional at Osceola at 10 a.m. In this year’s new firstweekend format, 13 teams will compete with the top two squads and the top four individuals in each weight class advancing to sectional competition.
The teams include fifth-ranked Amery, Osceola, Rice Lake, Northwestern, Ashland, St. Croix Falls, the Luck Co-op, Barron, Chetek-Weyerhaeuser/ Prairie Farm, Spooner-Webster and GNC squads Antigo and Tomahawk.
The Raiders feel like they’re ready. “The momentum is going to be huge coming into it,” Stark said. “We just have to keep working hard through our practices. We have one more week to work
GREAT NORTHERN CONFERENCE WRESTLING STANDINGS Duals Dual Meet Total W-L Pts. Pts. Pts. Medford 5-0 10 12 22 Lakeland 4-1 8 10 18 Tomahawk 3-2 6 8 14 Mosinee 2-3 4 6 10 Antigo 1-4 2 4 6 Rhinelander 0-5 0 2 2 Feb. 4 GNC Championships: 1. Medford, 486; 2. Lakeland, 344; 3. Tomahawk, 258; 4. Mosinee, 219; 5. Antigo, 213; 6. Rhinelander, 208. Feb. 11: Medford, Tomahawk and Antigo at WIAA Div. 2 super regional; Mosinee at WIAA Div. 2 Oconto Falls super regional; Lakeland and Rhinelander at WIAA Div. 1 Merrill regional. Feb. 14: WIAA Div. 2 team sectionals at St. Croix Central and Freedom, WIAA Div. 1 team sectional at D.C. Everest.
and we’ll be there.”
“I think physically we’re definitely there,” Sigmund said. “We just have to prepare mentally and win our matches with our minds, if that makes sense. If we beat them mentally then it’s a lot easier to beat them physically.”
Medford’s Braxton Weissmiller tries to gain leverage in his 220-pound match with Mosinee’s Teryn Walls Saturday. Weissmiller was impressive in this win, pinning Walls in 3:40.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS
Medford’s Owen Higgins works quickly to pin Rhinelander’s Cyrus Leisure in 38 seconds during their second-round match at Saturday’s GNC tournament.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS
