Jesse James Invitational

Well fans, another week of uncertainty in our schedule.  The weather forced a postponement of our quad with McCook/Montrose, Parker, and Howard.  We were able to host the Jesse James invitational despite the extreme temperatures.  I want to thank all the fans that braved the weather to watch the boys wrestle.  Also, a big thanks to the volunteers that helped throughout the day.  With their help, the day was able to run smoothly.  I really think the boys wrestled pretty well considering they hadn't practiced since Tuesday.  It takes tremendous dedication to work off the weight on your own when we aren't practicing.  It definitely separates itself from other sports when that happens.  The performance seemed to be a step in the right direction for the team.  We have really focused our thoughts on improving each time out so that we are at our peak when the district tournament comes around.  The boys understand that we are at that stretch of our season where we want to be better each time we wrestle and their hard work in the practice room is making that happen.  Considering we again only wrestled ten of the fourteen weights, a 4th place finish is pretty respectable.  We were on 16.5 points from 1st place and 3 from 2nd place.  The boys in the lineup are competing at a high level to be able to finish that close to teams with full lineups.

Team Scores:
Harrisburg - 126.5 points
Flandreau - 113
Dell Rapids - 113
Garretson - 110
Tri-Valley - 107
Fulda/Murray County Central - 81.5
West Central - 78.5
Deuel - 64
West Lyon - 31
103 Thomase Howe continues to battle every match even though he is weighing 92 pounds.  I believe the lessons he is learning this season will really mature him for next year.  When Thomas is actually big enough to wrestle at the weight he is at, he will be on the giving end more than the receiving end.
* lost by major decision to Jace Christiansen (Flandreau) 12 - 1
* won by decision over Jacob Huewe (Dell Rapids) 6 - 3
* lost by decision to Hunter Paulson (Harrisburg) 7 - 4

112 Colby Pierret returned to the lineup after an injury.  He too is experiencing the same problems that Thomas is going through.  Colby weighs right around 100 pounds and is also having his struggles.  One thing is for certain, he isn't giving up out there.  The learning will benefit him throughout the season and help for next year.
* lost by fall to Trenton Schmit (Harrisburg) 1:22
* lost by fall to Adam Krause (Deuel) 2:15

119 Cody Bonte wrestled as well this weekend as he has all year.  He avenged an early round loss in the consolation match by wrestling smart and staying aggressive.  Cody could do a lot of nice things as the season moves on if he wrestles like this the rest of the year. 
* lost by decision to Drew Brown (Harrisburg) 6 - 3
* won by decision over Taron Xavier (Dell Rapids) 5 - 0
* won by fall over Drew Brown (Harrisburg) 4:28
     3rd place finish

135 Tanner Donelan wrestled a smart tournament to finish in first place.  He is starting to have some wrestlers not open up against him in an attempt to frustrate Tanner.  There will be matches like this the remainder of the year, and he will just have to take the points that are there.  Sometimes a close score doesn't always show how close the match was.
* won by fall over Dakota Petersen (Flandreau) 0:51
* won by technical fall over Casey Lowe (West Central) 15 - 0
* won by decision over Cade Buysse (Dell Rapids) 3 - 1
     1st place finish

140 Scott Howe had a tremendous tournament for himself.  He not only won some tight matches, but he was able to stay focused on his matches while his opponents were trying to frustrate him.  He came from behind in both his semifinal and final matches to win the tournament.  This could be exactly what he needed to peak himself for the remainder of the season.
* won by technical fall over Alex Sandhurst (Fulda/MCC) 17 - 0
* won by decision in the ultimate tiebreaker over Alex Oaks (Harrisburg) 7 - 6 4ot
* won by decision over Kyle Scofield (Flandreau) 6 - 2
     1st place finish

145 Isaac Lukes showed improvement in areas that we have addressed the past couple weeks; however, he came up a bit short of placing.  He will continue to work on being consistent with his offense.  I believe he is really close to putting a full tournament together soon.  When that happens, Isaac will be back on the medal stand for himself and the team.
* won by fall over Shane Granum (Fulda/MCC) 1:06
* lost by fall to Garret Heiberger (Tri-Valley) 1:32
* lost by decision to Jackson Entringer (Dell Rapids) 6 - 5

152 Ben Westhoff showed signs of turning his season around this past weekend.  He entered the tournament unseeded and finished in 3rd place.  As he continues to work hard in practice, he season is slowly turning in the right direction.  His patience and dedication to the team are starting to pay off.  I think this really could be the beginning of some good things for him.
* lost by major decision to Thomas Hudson (Harrisburg) 18 - 8
* won by fall over Mike Jopson (Flandreau) 3:47
* won by decision over Tyler Stolsmark (West Central) 5 - 2
     3rd place finish

160 Jess Kruid returned to the lineup and wrestled extremely well in front of the home crowd.  Jess is determined to finish his senior year on a high note, and his hard work in practice could make that come true.
* lost by fall to Tim Weber (West Central) 1:23
* won by fall over Jason VanGinkel (West Lyon) 4:07
* won by injury default over Austin Gee (Dell Rapids) 2:22
     3rd place finish

171 Brady Bonte had a disappointing finish to his day.  Brady needs to find his wrestling identity again.  He has somewhat gone away from many of the things that have made him successful thus far in the season.  When he wrestles his match style, he is as tough as any to beat.  I don't think it will stay this way for long, and I see him returning to form fairly soon.
* won by decision over Brian Behrends (Fulda/MCC) 9 - 2
* won by decision over Trevor Dietrich (Flandreau) 8 - 6
* lost by fall to Spencer Schmahl (Deuel) 5:08
     2nd place finish

189 Ethan Storment outwrestled his seed for the tournament.  Any time you can do that, it has been a pretty good day.  He came up short against a tough kid in the finals, but overall he had a good day.  When Ethan wrestles under control, he does a lot of nice things that put himself into position to win matches.  His downfall can be that he gets a bit wild at times which causes him to get out of position.  This weekend he stayed under control and was awarded with a nice 2nd place finish.
* won by fall over Matt Beek (Fulda/MCC) 0:44
* won by fall over Cody Ahrendt (West Lyon) 2:37
* lost by fall to Evan Murphy (Dell Rapids) 3:18
     2nd place finish