Blasel, Hoppe pick up tourney wins in Antigo
By Nathaniel Underwood
The Abby/Colby wrestling team opened their 2024-25 season with the Red Robin Girls Invite and the John Roberts Scramble tournaments in Antigo this past Friday and Saturday. The girls team took 11th overall out of 23 teams, finishing with 58.5 points, while the boys placed 12th out of 18 teams after ending the day with 158.5 points.
Two A/C wrestlers started out their 2024-25 campaigns with tournament victories. Freshman Allyson Blasel started her high school career off with a bang, going undefeated on Friday evening to win the girls 185-pound weight class. Meanwhile, senior Jacob Hoppe claimed the top spot by picking up five wins in the boys 190-pound weight class.
In a round robin tournament, Blasel claimed victories in all five of her matches. Four of those wins came via pins in either the first or second rounds.
In her first bout of the day, she won by fall over Cameron’s Kierra Schuebel, earning a takedown and a nearfall before finishing the match with a pin at the last moment of the first round. She then scored a takedown and a reversal before pinning Wausau West’s Christiana Nordstrom in the second round.
Schuebel’s teammate Alyssa Sagen managed to get an early advantage by scoring the first takedown of the match, but Blasel escaped and then filed a takedown in round one to still hold an advantage. After scoring a reversal to start round two, she later won by fall over Sagen. Emily Jahns of Wausau West also managed to score three points on Blasel in their fourth match of the day, but two first round takedowns put Blasel ahead before she pinned Jahns in the following round. A medical forfeit in her final match secured the first place finish for Blasel. She scored 26.0 team points.
Hoppe won all four of his round robin matches to secure a spot in the 190-pound championship on Saturday.
A dominating performance over Anitgo’s Caleb Vandenlangenberg earned him a 17-1 technical fall victory to start off the day. He then pinned Menominee Nation’s Mitchell Waukau and Rosholt’s Keegan O’Donnell in the first round of his next two matches. While his fourth match of the day against Owen Hansen of Waupaca went to the third round, Hoppe was still in control of the bout, scoring seven points while not giving up any before winning by fall in the final period.
The A/C senior then faced off against Andy Servais of Pulaski in the championship match. The match went the distance, but Hoppe once again came out on top, outscoring Servais 10-7. A first round takedown by the A/C wrestler turned out to be the difference maker in the final, and four escapes and a third period takedown allowed Hoppe to weather a comeback attempt from his opponent. He earned 45.5 team points Matt Jakel also made it to his championship match on Saturday, representing the co-op in the 138-pound weight class. A quick pin of Wabeno/Laona/Three Lakes’ Michael Yaeger and a 10-0 major decision over Pulaski’s Mason Goodness propelled Jakel to two early wins. In the quarterfinals, the A/C junior earned another first round victory by fall, this time over Evan Kaufman of Crivitz/Wausaukee. His semifinal match against Hayward’s Jeremiah Kuehlman was a bit more difficult, with the pair tied at 8-8 heading into the final period. An escape from Kuehlman gave him a lead, but a penalty was awarded to Jakel to tie things up. A final takedown by Jakel with only seconds left broke the tie and secured his spot in the championship match. While the junior started the match against Wausau West’s Christopher Galang strong, earning the first points of the match with a takedown in the first period, it was all Galang afterward. The Wausau West wrestler scored 13 straight points to win by major decision. Jakel picked up 43.0 team points for his performance.
Fellow junior Tristen Smazal went 3-1 to take third in the 132-pound weight class. A 16-0 technical fall over Rhinelander’s Ivan Loka and a first round pin of Marathon’s CC Kasza put Smazal in the championship bracket. A first round takedown by Pulaski’s Broc Ambrosius in the semifinals put Smazal behind and he could not quite recover, losing a 7-5 decision to the eventual 132-pound champion. He then faced Wausau West’s Caleb Feil in the third place match. Smazal dominated the affair, racking up 19 points en route to a 19-3 technical fall victory and earning the team 35.0 points.
Alix Colby and Aiden Burt both went 32 and took fourth place in the 138-pound and 285-pound categories respectively. Colby started his day with a trio of wins by fall to get himself into the semifinals. There he faced off against Wausau West’s Galang, who pinned Colby at the 2:32 mark. In the third place match, he was pinned by Hayward’s Kuehlman, also in the second period. Burt followed a similar path, winning all three of his round robin matches by fall before being pinned by Rhinelander’s Reid Schultz in the semifinals. He then lost by fall to Hayward’s Micha Butler in the third place match. Burt picked up 33.0 team points for Abby/ Colby.
Makenna Herrmann went 3-1 in the 132-pound bracket and placed fifth overall. She split her first two matches, pinning Stevens Points’Aubree Rzepka before losing by a 16-8 major decision against Debra Kuss of Mishicot. The loss placed her in the consolation bracket, in which she won both her matches, defeating Pulaski’s Reese Burich and Rhinelander’s Mya Swanson by fall to earn herself fifth place and 31.5 team points.
In the 285 VR bracket, Landon Auberg also earned a fifth place finish for Abby/ Colby. He went 2-2 in his round robin play, all four of his matches being decided by first round pins. This earned him a spot in the fifth place match, where he defeated Wabeno/Laona/Three Lakes’ Sawyer Christianson by fall at the 0:37 mark.
Other placements included an eighth place finish for Kori Geiger, a 12th place finish for Izaac Sundermeyer, a 15th place finish for Phillip Vidal, a 17th place finish for Gilbert Sundermeyer, a 19th place finish for Eyan Cortista, and a 24th place finish for Max Meier.
