Four Hodag grapplers place at Northern Badger

The Rhinelander High School wrestling team brought a limited squad to River Falls last weekend and fared relatively well. Four of the seven Hodag wrestlers finished on the podium at the two-day Northern Badger Holiday Classic.

Overall, the Hodag boys took five wrestlers and finished 30th in a field of 44 teams while the Hodag girls brought only two wrestlers, but came away 16th out of 31 squads. 

The limited roster was by design, as the team used the tournament as an opportunity to get some of their more-experienced wrestlers some tougher matches in preparation for next month’s WIAA postseason. 

“The level of competition that was at River Falls was significantly higher than the tournaments that we’ve been at so far this year, which is the reason you do these kind of tournaments,” Hodag coach Scottie Arneson said. “Your other tournaments throughout the beginning of the year are to get everybody matches, and that’s the reason that we only took the seven that we took. We needed to find some really good competition and get one of those two-day tournaments in for those in those kids that might have a chance to punch their way to the state tournament this year.”

Two of Rhinelander’s five wrestlers on the boys’ side made it to the second day of the tournament. Senior Reid Schultz came home fourth in the 285-pound weight class while senior Logan Schwinger was eighth at 190. 

Schultz (13-4) needed only 50 seconds combined to pin his first two opponents on Friday to advance to the quarterfinals, where he was pinned by eventual runner-up Logan Brockman of St. Croix Falls with 12 seconds remaining in their match. 

Schultz then made it through three tight matches in the wrestle back — including a 4-2 decision over Hayward’s Micah Butler, who Schultz had lost two in the championship match of the Hodag Scramble — to make it to the third-place match. Schultz was pinned in the final round by Aiden Isaacson of Mondovi/Eleva-Strum.

“I think we wrestled four different kids that’ll be at our sectional, which is always a good thing,” Arneson said. “One of the other reasons that we wanted to make sure that, no matter how healthy or how unhealthy our team was, was to make sure that those guys got the opportunity to see some of the competition that we see at regionals and sectionals. Reid hasn’t been feeling the greatest. He’s down about 15 pounds from where we started the season. For him to move around 265-plus pounds and four stray matches is pretty remarkable.”

Schwinger (13-8) had a longer road to the placement rounds, but used a pin and a technical fall to make it through to Saturday. Schwinger won his first two matches on Saturday before dropping his final two to settle for eighth.

“For him to make day two after the only other time that we went to Northern Badger (in 2021) going 0-2, I think he was happy with,” Arneson said. “There’s more in the tank there, but that’s why it’s still December not January. To win three or four matches at one of these higher tournaments is it just a good showing of the work that he’s put in over the last couple years.”

On the girls’ side, Mya Swanson placed fourth at 132 pounds while Cassidy Lindner was sixth at 126. 

Swanson (11-4) pinned Lakeland’s Emma Louis to make it to the semifinals, where she lost to eventual runner-up Adrianna Der of Ladysmith. Swanson bounced back with a pin over Brooklyn D’Jock of the Luck co-op but Arcadia’s Kalyce Sobotta stopped her in the third-place match. 

“She gets herself and position to win by early takedowns and being a hammer on top,” said Arneson, who oversaw the girls over the weekend with coach Caleb Radtke unable to make the trip due to a prior family commitment. “Now we just got to find a way to get off the bottom. But she’s doing a really good job of putting herself in the position that she wants to wants to be in and she capitalizes off of other girls’ mistakes really, really well. That’s what happens when you wrestle for a really long time, you know how to capitalize on those situations.”

Lindner (9-6) won her opening match by pin to get to the semifinals. She would lose her remaining three matches, but Arneson said the first-year wrestler is faring well, considering her lack of experience. 

“She’s so new to the sport, she changes the game plan every single match, but whatever she says she’s going to do, she goes out there and puts herself in a position execute on that,” he said. “It’s just the amount of mat time isn’t there yet. We don’t know how to land or we don’t know to fall or how to turn our hips, but it’s funny to watch her because whatever plans she has in her head, she’s going to go out there and she does it 90% of the way. Now it’s just capitalizing on those opportunities that she puts herself in but, yeah, she’s doing really well.”

Anthony Boldt (144) and Dresden Klaver (157) each won one match for the Hodag boys before getting eliminated while Gus Porter went 0-2 at 150.

The Hodags have added a meet to their schedule and will host Phillips and Merrill tonight in a non-conference triangular at the James Williams Middle School gymnasium. Arneson said Phillips, like Rhinelander, has a young squad this year and that Merrill will likely bring a number of its varsity reserves as the teams try to gain more match experience for their wrestlers. 

“A lot of inexperienced wrestlers will be getting some good mat time on Friday,” Arneson said.

Tonight’s triangular gets underway at 6 o’clock.

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].