Hodag boys 10th, girls 6th at John Roberts Scramble

A Rhinelander High School wrestling team looking to turn the corner after a couple of lean years showed some improvement on Saturday its season opening competition.

The Hodag boys finished 10th and the Hodag girls were sixth in their respective divisions at the John Roberts Scramble in Antigo — a meet that featured 16 teams on the boys’ side and 13 teams on the girls’ side.

Owen Kurtz and Mya Swanson both went undefeated on the day, claiming title in the boys’ heavyweight and girls’ 126-pound brackets. 

Overall, on the boys’ side, Rhinelander improved after finishing 16th out of 19 teams in this event a season ago. Additional depth helped, as the Hodags had 12 wrestlers compete, compared to nine in last year’s event. 

“We’re really happy with how everybody competed today,” Hodag coach Scottie Arneson said. “There wasn’t a single person who, at the end of the match when they got tired, was giving up. We really couldn’t be any more proud of how they competed today. That just tells the kind of character we have on our team. Even when the times are tough, and maybe we’re down by 10, 11, 12 points, we were still fighting until the last whistle.”

While teams could enter multiple wrestlers in a weight class, only one of them was able to score. That hindered the Hodags in the team standings a bit as they flexed their depth in the upper weights. Rhinelander went 1-2 in the heavyweight class as Kurtz and junior teammate Reid Schultz both went undefeated in separate pools to set up an all-Hodag championship bout. Kurtz pinned Schultz 15 seconds into the second period to secure the title.

Overall, Kurtz was 5-0 with three pins on the day while Schultz went 4-1 with three pins and secured a 2-1 decision over Hayward’s Micah Butler to earn a spot in the finals.

Arneson said he quipped to the other coaches during the seeding meeting that he may have the two best heavyweights in the bracket. Kurtz and Schultz backed up his claim.

“It was really fun watching those two,” he said. “Having Reid back in the room this year has really brought the morale of the team up and those two practicing together, there’s a saying that iron sharpens iron. When you have two guys in the championship match in a tournament, that just goes to show that when you have good practice partners, good things will happen.”

    Rhinelander’s Mya Swanson stands on the top step of the podium after inning the girls’ 126-pound weight class of the John Roberts Scramble in Antigo Saturday, Dec. 2. (Submitted photo)
  

Swanson, a sophomore, cruised through her 10-wrestler bracket. She stopped all four of her opponents in the preliminary rounds with first-period pins and then used a seven-point second period to knock off Abbotsford/Colby’s Makenna Herrmann 7-0 in the championship match. 

“Mya had a really good day,” Hodag girls’ wrestling coach Eric Gobin said. “She was wrestling a really good wrestler (in the championship). She wrestled really smart and to her capabilities. I’m really glad to see all of that kind of pay off for her. With her putting in so much work over the summer, it’s really, really cool to see it all pay off for her. We’re happy for her to have a really good day.”

Logan Schwinger had a solid day for Rhinelander, going 4-1 and taking third at 175 pounds. The junior pinned his first three opponents to make it to the semifinals in the weight class. He was stopped their by eventual champion Owen Hanson of Waupaca but bounced back to take the third-place match in an 8-0 major decision over Marathon’s Reed McCain.

“Logan was grinding all day,” Arneson said. “He was in some tough matches early on in the day with some really tough freshmen, but he just finds a way to be in good position during the matches and finds a way to capitalize when other people make mistakes. He’s been doing a better job of getting to his offense. Now he’s got a little more horsepower because he’s an upperclassman. It’s just going to be fun watching him grow this year.”

The Hodags had four freshmen compete Saturday, led by Gavin Snider-Dotter, who went 3-2 on the day with three pins to take fifth in the 215-pound class.

“He’s been wrestling a long time. He took second at Freestyle and Greco state tournament last summer,” Arneson noted. “I kind of knew what kind of competitor he was. He weighed in at 196 pounds today and took fifth in a big boy weight class. The way he competed today just shows what he’s capable of.

Anthony Boldt, Dresden Klaver and Aiden Ostermann took seventh at 126, 138 and 150 pounds, respectively. Klaver and Ostermann were both 3-2 on the day while Boldt went 2-2. Freshman Hoyt Dantoin took fourth in a four-man bracket at 113. Gavin Liebherr was 0-3 and took seventh at 106. Avrom Barr was 13th at 126, while Shayden Hylleberg and Travis Trick were 14th and 16th, respectively at 215.

In other girls’ action, freshman Taylor Dahlquist debuted at 145 pounds, going winless on the day to take fourth in a four-girl pool.

“I think Taylor was a little nervous coming in and wrestling at the high school level,” Gobin noted. “It was just a matter of controlling some of those nerves today and being comfortable in the weight class she’s in. But it’s early in the season. It gives us stuff to work on, and we know the areas to kind of work on and improve.”

The Hodag boys will return to action this coming Saturday in the Laona/Wabeno/Three Lakes Invite hosted at the Forest County Potawatomi Community Center in Crandon. The Hodag girls will be back on the mat Dec. 16 at the Shawano Invitational.

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].