January 25, 2021 at 8:29 a.m.
Hodags take 4th in GNC wrestling tourney
Fox, Hugh Wiese claim individual titles
Hodags take 4th in GNC wrestling tourney
Rhinelander filled only nine of the 14 weight classes on Saturday, but five of its nine wrestlers finished first or second in their weight classes, led by individual conference titles for seniors Tim Fox and Hugh Wiese. Cayden Neri, Ben Sinclair and Owen Kurtz all finished second for the Hodags in their weight classes, all losing to state-ranked wrestlers in the final round.
"We're probably better set up for these individual tournament and how we wrestled today was pretty good," Hodag coach Paul Ellenbecker said. "We're kind of getting better at the right time of the year. You look at our day overall, five out of the nine are in the finals, top two in the conference. We wrestled well today. We've just got to regroup and get all of our guys back."
Fox controlled his four-man bracket at 120 pounds en route to his third straight conference championship. He recorded second-period pins over Tomahawk's Ryan Larson and Medford's Jude Stark before shutting out Lakeland's Ben Nemcek 5-0 in the final round.
"I had a lot of faith that Tim was going to get it done his senior year. He's one of the best wrestlers in the conference," Ellenbecker said. "You kind of expect it out of kids that have been there for a while and done it before. Tim just keeps on moving forward and toward his goal."
Wiese also had a dominant day for the Hodags at 126, pinning Lakeland's Jerome LeBarge to start the day before earning a second-period technical fall over top-seeded Chris Mackey of Antigo. From there, Wiese defeated Tomahawk's Blake Felser 9-2 and pinned Medford's Itsael Medina to finish undefeated on the day. It was the first time Wiese, in only his third year of competitive wrestling, earned all-conference honors.
"That's probably the one I'm most proud of today," Ellenbecker said. "Hugh's been the ultimate team guy all year wrestling up weight classes. He didn't want to cut weight at the beginning of the year. He wrestled up at 132, 138, wrestled some pretty big kids and took some losses. Now that he's down to 126, where he belongs, he's a very strong, physical kid. He pretty much took the tournament rather easily today.
"It's amazing a kid that just starts as a sophomore wins a conference title. It's good for Hugh. That's a good feeling, for a kid to come out late like that and now he's going to be in the history books as a conference champ."
Of Rhinelander's three runners up, senior Ben Sinclair came the closest to a conference title. He recorded first-period pins of his first four opponents at 195 before running into Tomahawk's Kade Wenninger in the finals. Sinclair jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the second period against the fourth-ranked 195-pounder in Division 2, but Wenninger responded to get within 6-5 at the end of the period. Wenninger tied it with an escape to begin the third and got a takedown with 15 seconds remaining to take the lead in the match. Sinclair escaped in the finals seconds, but came out on the short end of an 8-7 decision.
"Wenninger's ranked somewhere in the state in D2. He's a good wrestler. He pinned Ben in the last dual meet," Ellenbecker said. "We made a couple of adjustments and Ben went back to wrestling aggressive and almost had him in the first period, but he just couldn't defend the shots at the end. Wenninger had good shots for a big kid. That was the difference in the match."
Neri went 4-1 on the day at 160 to earn all-conference honors for the second straight year. The junior had a pair of decisions and a pair of pins to his credit before running in to No. 3 (D2) Gage Coppock of Mosinee in the finals. Coppock pinned Neri late in the first period.
"In the finals he wrestled a kid that's probably the most talented kid in our conference," Ellenbecker said. "Just to get there and take second is a big deal. You look at all the seniors that are leaving the conference this year, it should be Cayden's goal to be a conference champ next year. He put himself in position this year and he's starting to build a name for himself a little bit."
Kurtz, a freshman, pinned his first two opponents at 285 before losing to Tomahawk senior Eric Decker (No. 8, D2) in the finals. Kurtz got the opening takedown against the undefeated Decker, but Decker got a reversal, put Kurtz to his back and finished the pinfall late in the first period.
"Owen took him down to start the match and he was up on him. It's tough being a freshman in the upper weights," Ellenbecker said. "You're wrestling men right now and Owen just turned 15 years old. His future's so bright. It would be a shock to me if he wasn't a three-time conference champ moving forward. He's just a worker who's going to continually get better. The sky's the limit for him."
Conner Jensen made his season debut for Rhinelander after being sidelined most of the year due to a hand injury. He went 1-3 on the day to finish fourth at 220. Kyle Wiese and Joe Fugle were each fourth at 113 and 182, respectively. Robert Schramke finished fifth at 132.
Tomahawk edged Medford 425-382 to claim the tournament. The two teams shared the GNC championship based on Medford head-to-head win over the Hatchets earlier in the season.
Saturday's meet was the first opportunity for Rhinelander to show off its new 128,000-square foot dome to the rest of the GNC. Ellenbecker said Rhinelander "knocked it out of the park" with the facility and how Saturday's tournament was run.
"I think our dome was eye-opening to the people around our conference," he said. "Every coach said something to me today like, 'Wow, this is awesome. This is impressive.'"
Rhinelander begins WIAA tournament play this coming Saturday in a seven-team Division 1 regional at D.C. Everest.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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