FARWELL — For the first time this season, the
Manistee High School wrestling team came home with some hardware. The
co-op Chippewas took second place in their division at a 15-team
tournament at Farwell on Saturday.
“It was a great day,” said Manistee coach Chris Codden. “To bring home a
trophy, it’s been some time since we’ve done that. Hopefully this gets
the kids on a winning run.”
It was the best showing of the season for Manistee. “Our kids were very
aggressive,” Codden said. “They were attacking. That’s what it is. If
we’re aggressive, we win. If we’re not, we lose.”
Manistee finished the day 3-2 overall after winning three of four
matches in the Gold Division, while Alex Meyers, David Engstrom and
Brenna Ramirez all took home medals for their performance.
The Chippewas started the day with wins over Houghton Lake (60-22),
Harrison (60-24) and Newaygo (54-30).
“The way we win, we don’t get pinned,” Codden said. “Those first three
wins we had in a row, people stayed off their backs, fought to get off
their backs. We still have a lot of work to do, but for the most part it
was definitely a great day.” After running off three straight wins,
Manistee lost the division final to Frankenmuth (61-18).
“We kind of ran into an equal opponent,” Codden said of Frankenmuth.
“Each match could have gone either way. Almost every single match was a
six-minute match.”
After finishing second in the division, Codden said he was able to
choose an opponent from another division to wrestle, and selected host
Farwell. The Chippewas lost 51-20, and Codden said he had some injured
wrestlers. |
“I gave up some weights,” he said. “We were
pretty beat up at the end of the day. Houghton Lake and Harrison were
not pushovers. They were pretty physical teams.”
At 103 pounds, Meyers went 4-1 for a medal, as did Ramirez, who finished
4-1 splitting time at 160 and 171 pounds, while Engstrom received a
medal for finishing 3-1 at 119 pounds.
Also for Manistee, Haydon Codden (125), Nic Carter (135) and Dakota
Girard (152) all finished 3-2, Tucker Bruce (140) went 2-1, Brian Fisk
(119) finished 1-0, Zach Nezki (160/171) and Trevor Schwandt (189) went
2-2, Alex Waterman (215) went 2-3, Jon Bailey (112) finished 1-3, Mason
Wallace (130) and Lane Gancarz (145) both went 1-4 and Travis McKenney
(112) finished 0-1.
Brian Grage (171) went 1-1 for his first varsity win, while Travis
Hubbard (heavyweight) finished 2-3 and received a team medal for most
improved.
“I think a lot of it was the freshmen were tired of losing,” Codden
said. “They had enough of the sophomores and juniors and seniors from
other teams telling them basically, know your place. Well, the freshmen
came through and definitely knew their place.
“We were definitely on top of our game and the kids were absolutely
excited about what we did.”
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