A middle school update from middle school coach John McDonald…
The Young War Dogs wrestled in top gear when they took to the mat this past Saturday at the Neillsville Team Duals Tournament. The tournament consisted of 8 teams spilt into two 4 team pools with a championship round at the end. Scoring was based on 14 counted weight classes.
With a very young team in age and experience; in the opening round Sparta faced D.C. Everest. They battled top to bottom earning a 39 – 24 team win. “Our kids showed that staying focused and keeping in mind our Team First mentality they can wrestle next to anyone,” Head Coach John McDonald added. Next they took on Westby again battling hard all 3 minutes of their match to earn a 40 – 16 win. In their final dual within pool play, Sparta wrestled against a team called the “All-Stars”. The Cadott wrestling team did not show for competition forcing coaches to put together a team of wrestlers from various teams to ensure kids could get as many matches as possible. Sparta trounced the competition earning a decisive 48 – 9 victory. With a 3 – 0 team dual Sparta found themselves in the championship round of wrestling taking on Marshfield.
Marshfield jumped out to an early 12 – 0 with pins before Sparta’s Vince Polhamus and Tye Klass came back to set the score to 12 – 6 . After a controversial line up change and decision making from Marshfield the score read 36 – 6. After a pin from Corbin Hauser the score lined up at 36 – 12. Marshfield would gain ground to 48 points before Sparta could come out and get 9 points back. The final reading 48 – 21.
“Our Young War Dogs battled hard all day to get to this point. We as coaches are extremely proud of how they wrestled,” Head Coach John McDonald added. “ Our goal today was to get the wrestlers as many matches as possible. They wrestled hard all day for the team giving their best performance each and every time. All their hard work in practice is paying off and it was nice to see that today,” McDonald said.
Going 4 – 0 individually in scoring matches on the day were Madden Connelly and Hunter Vieth. Nicholas Gann also turned in a 4 – 0 performance with 1 scoring match and 3 exhibition matches.
Sparta heads to Tomah Friday December 11th and hosts a home meet Monday December 14th.
