Team Review: RHS Track & Field

Much of the talk during coach Aaron Kraemer’s five seasons at the helm of the Rhinelander High School track program has centered around the turnaround and success that the boys’ squad has had in that time frame — winning a pair of Great Northern Conference championships and qualifying a number of athletes for the WIAA state meet.

2024 will likely be remember as the year that the Hodag girls took a step forward and rivaled the success of their boys’ counterparts.

The Hodag girls posted their best outdoor conference meet finish since 1995, taking fourth at the GNCs this year. What’s more, the team qualified three entries for the WIAA state meet and had a podium finisher at state for the third time in the last five seasons. 

Part of the team success was due to the sheer number of athletes the Hodags had this year, topping out over 100 from the first time in Kraemer’s tenure. The added depth, on both sides, led to solid team finishes on meet days.

“This year’s track season was one that kind of blew me away, with the amount of athletes that we started with,” Kreamer said during the team’s banquet. “We had 106 at our parent meeting and tonight we’re going to be recognizing 104. We added some, gained some and lost some. We’ve had a great season with a lot of great accomplishments for our athletes.”

Here are five storylines from the recently completed season.

Boys’ team

    In this May 23, 2024 file photo, Rhinelander’s Myles Eagleson competes in the long jump during a WIAA Division 2 sectional track meet in Colby. Eagleson, a sophomore, was the GNC champion in the triple jump and conference runner-up in the long jump. (Jeremy Mayo/River News)
  

Though the Hodag boys had no state qualifiers, they turned in a solid performance this year as they placed a close fourth at the GNC meet and were sixth at regionals.

The team spread the wealth around but scored the bulk of its points in the field events this year. 

The Hodags won two events at conference. Sophomore Myles Eagleson took the triple jump while the Hodags earned first team in the boys’ 4x100 relay with Zach Germain, Ben Olson, Sam Zwaard and Paul Van Camp. Eagleson may have been a whisker away from vying for field athlete of the year honors in the GNC. He took second in the long jump at conference, eclipsed for the win on the last jump by Mosinee’s Omar Bailey. Additionally, Abe Barlog was the conference runner-up in the boys’ 300 hurdles while Logan Schwinger finished in the boys’ shot put and third in the discus. Germain took third in the boys’ 100 meters and Connor Dumpprope finished third in the boys’ 300 hurdles.

    In this May 3, 2024 file photo, Rhinelander’s Logan Schwinger competes the shot put during the Otto Bacher Invitational track meet in Merrill. Schwinger was the conference runner up and a sectional qualifier in the shot put. (Jeremy Mayo/River News)
  

Rhinelander really started to showcase its depth in the throwing events late in the season with Schwinger, fellow junior Reid Schultz and senior Sam Balge. They finished second, fourth and fifth in the shot put at regionals, with Schultz bumping Balge out of the final transfer spot to sectionals with his final throw. 

Eagleson advanced to sectionals in the long jump, taking third at regionals with a leap of 19-10 3/4. He finished sixth in the triple jump, missing the top four by roughly seven inches. Rhinelander also qualified its 4x100 and 4x200 relay teams for sectionals.

The only thing that seemed to hold the Hodag boys back this season was injuries. Senior sprinter Payton Campbell was lost for the year after suffering a hamstring injury early in the outdoor season. Junior Greyson Gremban, who was slowed early in the year by a foot injury, was unable to get back to sectionals in the 3,200 meters as he did as a sophomore. He still was part of a runner-up finish in the 4x800 relay at conference with teammates Shawn Denis, Jackson Weinzatl and Avrom Barr. Junior Truman Lamers also missed a spot at sectionals after being a strong triple-threat contender for the Hodags in the high, long and triple jumps. He tweaked an ankle during the Otto Bacher Invite May 3 in Merrill and struggled to match his early season performances down the stretch. 

“I blame myself for it a little bit. As the year goes one, we’ve got to be a little smarter in taking care of him and making sure he gets to the end of the season and has his best events at the end of the year,” Kraemer said.

Girls squad

    In this May 31, 2024 file photo, Rhinelander’s Aila Bergman races Brodhead/Juda’s Addison Yates in the D2 girls’ 100-meter hurdles during the WIAA state track and field meet in La Crosse. In addition to competing at state in the 100 hurdles, Bergman broke her own school record in the 300 hurdles at sectionals. (Brett LaBore/Lakeland Times)
  

The Hodag girls matched the boys from a team performance standpoint, finishing fourth at conference and sixth at regionals. Their squad as primarily led by a talented group of underclassmen.

Sophomores Aila Bergman and Libbey Buchmann headlined that list, qualifying for state in the 100 meter hurdles and the discus throw, respectively. Both set school records this year in the process. Bergman broke her own mark, going 46.70 seconds in the 300 hurdles at sectionals as she narrowly missed a trip to state in that event. Buchmann broke a 25-year-old mark in the discus, throwing it 134 feet, 9 inches at the Dale Peterson Invite in Antigo May 16.

Those results were just the tip of the iceberg for the Hodags, however. Bergman was the individual conference champ in the 100 and 300 hurdles, took fourth in the 200 meters and was fifth in the long jump. Buchmann added a runner-up finish in the discus and the Hodags were conference champions in the 4x100 and 4x400 relays and were runners-up in the 4x200.

The Hodags backed that up with a strong showing at regionals. Bergman and Buchmann both advanced in two events while the Hodag girls qualified in both the 4x100 and 4x400 relays.

Close at conference

The record will show both squads took fourth at the GNC meet, but both teams were only a handful of points from finishing higher than that. Rhinelander led the boys’ standings with three events remaining before fading to fourth, only eight points behind co-champions Lakeland and Northland Pines and five points behind third-place Medford.

The Hodag girls finished a half point behind Medford for third place in what proved to be a topsy-turvy year in the GNC. Last year’s GNC champ, Mosinee, finished last this year in the girls’ standings while Tomahawk went from worst to first in a single season. 

“Both on the boys and the girls, we have a lot to be proud of tonight,” Kraemer said afterward. “There were a lot of things we expected and things we thought would happen. I talked to our athletes about fear and being scared. That’s a natural feeling when you get into championship season, but my message was that on the other side of fear is everything that you want. They took that to heart and went after it today. They did an excellent job. I’m very, very proud to be their coach.”

State run

For Buchmann, Bergman and the girls’ 4x100 relay team, the season culminated at a the WIAA D2 state meet in La Crosse. 

While Buchmann was unable to replicate her school-record toss from mid-May, she won regionals, took fourth in the toughest D2 sectional in the state and then finished fourth at the WIAA state meet. 

It wasn’t an easy path back to the podium as she barely snuck in as the 10th and final athlete to qualify for the finals before she uncorked a toss 123-8.

“She’s got the flair for the dramatic, that’s for sure, Kraemer said of Buchmann. “Last year was kind of the same thing. It’s not fun for a coach to watch but, at the same time, it is exhilarating. She definitely deserves to be considered one of the best in the state in Division 2. She earned that for sure.” 

Bergman got to state with a personal-best run of 15.86 seconds at sectionals, which had her seeded ninth going into the state meet. She was unable to match her sectional performance as she took eighth in her heat, and 16th overall with a time of 16.37 seconds. That ended up being 0.35 seconds away from making the finals.

The Hodag 4x1 featured a squad comprised of foreign exchange student Lena Timphus, junior Lexi Bishop, sophomore Violet Biolo and freshman Olivia Ruetz. The quartet had a thrilling finish at sectionals, with Bishop holding on to the fourth and final transfer spot to the state meet by 0.04 seconds. They finished 15th at the state meet.

What’s next

Considering that five of the six athletes who competed at state are underclassmen, Kraemer said there’s plenty of excitement for the future of the program.

“That’s the special thing about the girls’ team, they’re very, very young,” Kraemer said. “Obviously, we’re going to miss some of our senior girls … It’s going to be tough to replace them, but we have a very, very young team and a lot of talented and exciting girls moving forward.”

Overall, the future seems to be bright for the Hodag program. On the girls’ side, nine of the 11 athletes who earned all-conference recognition will return, including six first-teamers. The boys will have 10 all-conference athletes back including four who earned first-team honors. 

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].