Indians sending six to sectional
By Greg Seubert
Apparently, winning a conference championship isn’t enough for the Weyauwega-Fremont wrestling team.
The Indians followed their Central Wisconsin Conference title with a first-place finish Feb. 11 at a WIAA Division 3 regional at Little Wolf High School in Manawa.
W-F will send six wrestlers – including three regional champions – to the Bonduel Sectional Saturday, Feb. 18, at Shawano High School.
Before that, however, the Indians competed Feb. 14 in a Division 3 team sectional at Amherst High School. W-F faced another regional champion, Crandon, in a semifinal match and the winner of that match took on Stratford or Coleman.
The Indians won the seven-team regional with 231 points. Other team scores were Wittenberg-Birnamwood (189.5), Rosholt (132), Manawa (128), Tri-County (117.5), Amherst (89) and Almond-Bancroft/Pacelli (47).
Cian Fischer (106 pounds), Easton Groskreutz (113) and Justin Kempf (120) placed first. Fischer pinned Wittenberg-Birnamwood’s Chad Moegenburg in 3:08 to kick off the championship matches. Groskreutz followed Fischer’s win by pinning another Wittenberg-Birnamwood wrestler, Alex Lorbeck, in 48 seconds and Kempf handed Rosholt’s Adam Charnecke an 18-5 loss in the next final match.
“We got out to a fast start today and built up a big lead,” W-F coach Tim Potratz said. “We didn’t finish the tournament the way we would have liked. Five more kids had a chance to advance with one more win, but we fell just short in some close matches.”
Patrick Kepler (182), Austin Bartel (195) and Dylen Kicherer (220) also advanced to sectional competition by placing second.
Also placing for the Indians were Logan Kicherer, third at 126; Adam Batten, third at 132; Jacob Kuckkahn, third at 145; Tyler Wetzel, third at 160; Kyle Loehrke, third at 170.
“Those third-place points, plus fourth-place finishes by Ean Marker and Taylor Brazil, opened up the team score for us to win the tournament,” Potratz said. “We also led all tournament teams with 13 pins, which added a huge 26 points to the team score.”
Meanwhile, Manawa will send four wrestlers to Shawano: Ben Beyer won the 170-pound championship, while Garrett Bristol, Zach Johnson and Trent Zabel placed second at 138, 152 and 285, respectively.
Beyer pinned Loehrke in 3:13 in the 170-pound final and Wittenberg-Birnamwood’s Allen Uttecht beat Zabel 2-0 in the 285 final, but Bristol and Johnson came back through the wrestleback round. Bristol fell to Tri-County’s Tyler Kramer 9-5 in the 138 finals, but finished second by pinning Wittenberg-Birnamwood’s Logan Muscha in 1:34. Johnson handed Wetzel a 9-4 loss in the second-place match.
Potratz knows his team will have its hands full in the team sectional against two of the state’s top Division 3 programs in Stratford and Coleman.
“This was another great team effort with 13 of the 14 boys winning at least one match and kids going for pins whenever possible,” he said. “The team is really fired up to represent our community and our school in the team sectional at Amherst.”