Pigskin Preview Week 1: Rhinelander at Ashland

The dress rehearsals are over and things happen for real tonight as the 2025 high school football season kicks off for the Rhinelander Hodags.

Rhinelander will open against a familiar foe as it faces the Ashland Oredockers at Weikal Field in Ashland. The old-school feel of the football-only venue has coach Aaron Kraemer and the Hodags excited as they look to improve upon last year’s 3-6 campaign and get back to the WIAA playoffs after missing the tournament two of the last three seasons. 

“My favorite venue that we play at so far, is Ashland. I can’t wait to get up there and play there and play a tough Ashland team.”

The Hodags opened last season with a 20-0 victory over the Oredockers in Rhinelander, part of a 3-1 start for the team. The Hodags fell off from there, however, dropping their final five games as injuries and close losses mounted. 

Ashland, meanwhile, won only once last season after it was moved by the WIAA from the GNC to the Heart O’North Conference. That was an 8-0 win in Week 4 at Cumberland. However, Kraemer said, given the success Ashland has had in track and powerlifting, the Oredockers have the athletes in place to have a turnaround campaign this year. 

“They do have some good athletes, you know, looking at the film,” he said. “They’ve got a couple really good wings, and their quarterback is new this year, and maybe a younger guy. He is dynamic and they scored some touchdowns (in last week’s scrimmage) against Northland Pines and against Merrill. In the middle, I think they are physical and we’re going to have to match that defensively to their offense.”

Rhinelander comes off a solid scrimmage last Friday at Antigo in which it scored three touchdowns and allowed three. Most importantly, and unlike last season, the Hodags excited scrimmage week healthy and have virtually their full complement of players ready to go for tonight’s opener. 

“Excited about what our varsity guys did on Friday. There was a lot of things to learn from in the scrimmage film, but I thought we did really well. Coming out of the scrimmage were healthy and we’re excited to play against Ashland this week,” Kraemer said.

Here are five storylines entering tonight’s game.

Abe’s debut

Junior Abe Gretzinger gets set to make his first varsity start at quarterback tonight for the Hodags. Last week’s scrimmage showed some of his promise, and some areas for improvement. Gretzinger went 10 of 18 for 132 yards with a touchdown and three interceptions. All three picks came in the first two sessions, and he completed his final eight passes of the day.

“Abe’s going to continue to get better as the season goes on every single game he’s learning,” Kraemer said. “Every single day at practice he’s learning. So I can’t wait to see what the offense can do this year.” 

Receivers Evan Shoeder and Rowan Wiczek combined to catch seven passes for 108 yards in the scrimmage as the Hodags look to stretch defenses both vertically and horizontally, and open up more holes in the ground game.

“I think just giving our guys our chances to make plays on the edges and trying to get the ball out to the edges, I think we’ll soften the box and then allow us to run the way we need to. But the most important thing is being efficient there,” Kraemer said.

Ashland’s defense

Defensively, the Oredockers graduated their two all-conference selections from 2024 in defensive lineman Gunnar Crowe and linebacker Owen Leask. But the team’s top tackler from last year, Wyatt Lund, returns. He had 91 stops including eight tackles for loss a season ago. That included 10 stops in last year’s opener against the Hodags.

“Big in the middle, which we’re used to with Ashland, and physical,” Kraemer said of Ashland base 5-2 look. “Their linebackers move well laterally, so we have to be aware of that in our lateral run game. The big thing for us is to attack areas where we think that they’re maybe weak.”

Rhinelander had success in the ground game against Ashland last year, rushing for 256 yards. That included a 105-yard effort, on just three carries, for Cyrus Leisure. He scored from 63 yards out in the waning moments of the third quarter to put that game out of reach.

Ashland’s offense

Lund figures to feature prominently on the offensive side of the ball for the Oredockers as well. He was Ashland’s leading rusher last year, carrying 97 times for 720 yards and a score. He was held to 25 yards on six carries in the opener against Rhinelander last year. 

Expect Lund to lead an Ashland option attack that will be run-first, but may throw it from time to time.

“We have to continue to set the edge hard. I think that’s big against this team this week with Ashland, the way that they run their veer and their midline,” Kraemer said. “We’ve got to set that edge and make sure we understand option responsibilities. But we fly to the football and we make gang tackles, and we made a lot of tackles for loss in the scrimmage, just by reading and making intuitive plays, especially from the linebacker corps.” 

Silence the doubters

The Hodags were picked to finish sixth in the annual Great Northern Conference football media poll (see Page 8). Kraemer said he can understand the selection, given how the Hodags finished last season on a five-game losing streak, but said his team has the ability to fly under the radar and surprise people by season’s end. 

“We have a talented team, just like last year,” he said. “And I think that with that talent, we can we can do some things that, you know, the media says sixth, but we can do some things that can really shock that media poll, I think.” 

Big picture

Tonight’s game carries more significance than last year’s did, given the changes in the WIAA playoff qualifying format that have taken place this year. All nine regular season games —both conference and non-conference — count equally toward making the postseason. 

Yet Kraemer, as he said earlier in the preseason, contends that the Hodags need to be smart with their roster and not sacrifice health at the end of the season for an early-season victory. That means the team will likely be judicious rotating players in and out of the lineup tonight in an effort to stay fresh.

“We need to continue to get better. And so to try to throw our best 11 out there every single time in Week 1 is not going to behoove us in Week 9,” he said. “And it’s going to actually make us take a step back. So the most important thing is to get as many guys ready to play, so we’re playing our best football by the end of the season. 

“Of course, we’re going to go out and we’re going to do our best that we can to win the game, and we’re going to try the best we can to win against Hayward. I know our guys are hungry for that. But when we get to Lakeland Week 3, and when we move on through the GNC schedule, we want to be playing better every single week.” 

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].