Team review: RHS baseball

The 2024 season was the lowest point in quite some time for the Rhinelander High School baseball program. The Hodags went just 1-19, by far their worst record in coach Joe Waksmonski’s nearly two decades at the helm, and were in need of a reboot. 

An influx of young, talented underclassmen certainly helped the Hodags rebound to a 13-11 record in 2025. But, moreover, Waksmonski said last week during the team’s banquet that the Hodags’ turnaround came from the team buying into a new identity for the program.

“Whether it was a preparation going into the season, during the season, the way we all practiced, the way we competed during the games, this group came together, and they forced us — as a program — to do things differently. And consequently, we started having success,” Waksmonski said.

Though the Hodags had some early-season struggles, they began to warm up with the weather and had a strong end to the season. Rhinelander won seven of its final nine games, finished tied for second in the Great Northern Conference and came one win away from having their first trip to sectionals since 2021.

“We have nothing to hang our head about. We ended our season with the winning record and it’s a great, great stride for our program this year to go in that winning direction,” Waksmonski said following a season-ending 9-4 loss to Mosinee in the regional finals. “A lot of growth happened from the beginning of the season to now. Really for the most part, I felt like we played our best baseball going over the postseason.” 

Here are five storylines from the recently completed season. 

Slow start

Though the Hodags showed some early flashes, it took a while — especially for the offense — to find its stride in a competitive Great Northern Conference. 

Rhinelander sat 3-5 in the conference through the first eight games and scored just five runs in their five conference losses. That included a 4-0 loss to rival Lakeland, a 2-1 loss in 10 innings to Northland Pines and a 1-0 loss at Tomahawk. 

Overall, despite hitting .266 in league play, the Hodags had only the fifth-best offense in the GNC in terms of run production, averaging 4.7 runs per game in the conference and 5.0 runs per game overall. 

Early in the season, Waksmonski stressed the need for the team to have the ability to hit the ball hard on a line, because fly balls simply don’t carry as far in cool conditions — which were prevent until mid-May.

“It’s hard to hit a baseball far in the air in northern Wisconsin in (early spring),” Waksmonski said after the 1-0 loss at Tomahawk. “So, we just talked about making the adjustments that you have to do with your swing, that hit line drives and, you know, we just didn’t do it enough tonight.”

Strong finish

    In this May 22, 2025 file photo, Rhinelander’s Conner Rappley pitches during the third inning of a GNC baseball game at Medford. Rappley pitched a perfect game in an 8-0 win over the Raiders, highlighting a strong sophomore campaign in which he had a 4-2 record and a staff-best 1.97 ERA.(Matt Frey/Star News)
  

The turning point for the Hodag offense seemed to come late in a road game at Antigo May 13. Trailing 8-3 after five innings, the Hodags scored four times in the sixth and seventh innings to knock off the Robins 11-8 — completing their first season sweep of Antigo since 2011. 

The momentum continued from there as Rhinelander beat eventual GNC-champ Mosinee in dramatic walk-off fashion 4-3 after the tying and winning runs came across following an error with two outs in the seventh. 

Rhinelander avenged its early-season loss to Lakeland by doubling up the T-Birds 8-4 in Minocqua and then, quite literally, had the perfect ending to their conference season in an 8-0 win at Medford. 

Sophomore Conner Rappley pitched a perfect game in that contest as the Hodags cost the Raiders a shot at the GNC title and finished tied with Medford for second in the conference standings.

“It’s definitely a good, good feeling having a winning record in the conference and do it in the fashion that we did it — playing our best baseball going into the postseason,” Waksmonski said.

Playoff dramatics

Rappley’s strong play continued into the postseason as he struck out 12 batters over 6 2/3 innings in a 5-0 shutout win over Amery to start the playoffs. That set the stage for the Hodags to go on the road and face second-seeded St. Croix Falls in a regional semifinal. 

That game was postponed a day due to rain, and was plenty dramatic once it took place. Trailing 2-1 in the seventh inning Rhinelander displayed some more late magic as John Turek scored on a sacrifice fly by Jackson Waydick, and Vince White scored on the same play following an overthrow to third. Rappley then slammed the door in the bottom of the inning as the Hodags pulled out a 3-2 upset.

“That’s an unbelievable feeling. You know, I feel great for this group of guys, this group of kids, and, you know, kind of the way they’ve persevered through the whole season,” Waksmonski said afterward.

The Hodags had left Rhinelander a day early to break-up the three-hour jaunt to St. Croix Falls but ended up having to stay overnight two nights in a hotel after the game was postponed a day due to rain. Rhinelander then hopped right back on the road to face Mosinee and Waksmonski said his team simply ran out of gas in the regional final.

“You hate to make excuses about riding in the bus the last two or three days across the state of Wisconsin, but, you just could kind of tell fatigue kind of caught up to us a little bit today,” he said.

Statbook

    In this May 23, 2025 file photo Rhinelander’s Dylan Vanderbunt makes contact on a pitch during a non-conference baseball game against Marathon at Stafford Field. Vanderbunt led the Hodags offensively this spring, hitting .360 with a team-high 13 stolen bases. (Bob Mainhardt for the River News)
  

Offensively a number of Rhinelander’s first-time varsity players more than held their own during the season. Bishop, a sophomore, and White, a freshmen, were two of the three players on the team to hit over .300 on the season — with Bishop batting .320 and White batting .303. Sophomore Abe Gretzinger narrowly missed joining the two as he hit .299 on the spring. Conner Rappley hit .242 but had the team’s lone home run of the season. While Jackson Waydick hit .238, he drew a team-high 25 free passes thanks to 19 walks and six hit by pitches. That put his on base percentage at .444 — third best on the team.

Rhinelander got plenty of production from a few of its returning players as well as senior Dylan Vanderbunt hit a team-high .360 on the year and was 13 for 13 in stolen base attempts. Senior Seth Nofftz batted .288 with a team-high 16 RBIs and sophomore Rowen Wiczek, who was a varsity starter in 2024, hit .257 with 14 RBIs. 

On the mound Conner Rappley and Waydick turned into Rhinelander’s 1-2 punch. Rappley went 4-2 on the season with a 1.97 ERA and 61 strikeouts over 55 1/3 innings. Waydick was 3-4 with a 3.29 ERA and 41 strikeouts over 38 1/3 innings. While Vanderbunt had a few starts, he excelled coming out of the bullpen as he went 4-1 with a save. He had a 2.48 ERA and 29 strikeouts over 31 innings of work. 

Overall Rhinelander’s efforts were rewarded with six players receiving all-conference honors — Vanderbunt, Waydick, Rappley, Bishop, Gretzinger and Nofftz. 

What’s next

Rhinelander will certainly have some pieces to fill as they graduate six seniors from this year’s squad including Vanderbunt, Nofftz, Turek, Tyler Chariton, Mason Schmidt and Barak Rappley.

“They kind of got to see the beginning of what I think is going to be a real good era of our program. And they were a part of that,” Waksmonski said. 

Oddly, Rhinelander is not projected to have any seniors on the roster next spring, but will still have a varsity roster with plenty of experience with six starters due back from this year’s squad. Moreover fellow juniors to be Charlie Johnson and Josh Willoughby split time between varsity and JV this season and have already seen significant playing time this summer for the Rhinelander Post 7 American Legion ball team, along with a number of this year’s varsity starters. 

Waksmonski said between the players who have made their way to high school, and those coming up from the youth levels, the new identity of Rhinelander baseball includes lots of potential.

“We can win conference. We can win a regional, we can go to a state tournament. And it starts with your work ethics and your commitment to the game of baseball,” Waksmonski told the team at this year’s banquet. “That’s your new identity. That’s the new identity for this program, is the work ethic and the commitment to the games.”

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].