Person 10th, Fredrickson 12th for Wolfpack at Northern Badger Classic
WOLFPACK WRESTLING
Two of Cornell-Gilman-Lake Holcombe’s three available wrestlers placed at the 45-team Northern Badger Wrestling Classic hosted by River Falls Thursday and Friday.
Senior Braeden Person finished 10th out of 34 wrestlers registered for the 152-pound weight class while finishing 3-3 in the bracket. He is now 10-5 for the season.
Person pushed his way to the quarterfinals by starting with two wins. He pinned Landon Parrott of Black River Falls in 1:32 and then got the only points in a defensive battle with Ellsworth sophomore Blake Nelson, winning 2-0.
The ninth seed to start the tournament, Person met the top seed and eventual champion, Nathan VandeHey of Freedom (25-1) in the quarterfinals. VandeHey pinned Person in 1:42.
In consolation competition, Person was knocked out of the third-place bracket with a 6-5 loss to Menomonie’s Walker Ferguson. Person shut out another opponent, Alexander Campbell of Chetek-Weyerhaeuser/Prairie Farm, 3-0 to earn a shot at ninth place. But, James Bruhn of Phillips (11-6) won that match by pin in 3:50.
At 132 pounds, sophomore Preston Fredrickson finished 12th out of 27 wrestlers after starting competition as the 25th seed.
Fredrickson (5-7) was pinned in the first round by fifth-seeded William Penn, a 16-3 junior from Ellsworth, in a time of 51 seconds. But Fredrickson made a push in the consolation bracket by winning three straight matches. He pinned Drake Welker of Cumberland in 1:22, Alex Obermueller of Boyceville in 3:28 and Blake Fox of Somerset in in 2:14. Fox is 11-5.
That loss put Fredrickson in position to finish as high as ninth, but he was knocked off 10-2 by Vinny Costabilo of River Falls and was pinned in 4:14 by Ben Wagner of Freedom.
The Wolfpack’s third wrestler, freshman Anthony Schofield, went 1-2 at 220 pounds. He started with a pin in 3:06 over Sullivan King of Black River Falls, but Edgar’s Harrison Graveen knocked him into consolation competition with a pin in 4:28 and he was eliminated by Northwestern’s Caleb Wakefield with a pin in 2:14.
Junior Troy Duellman was held out of the tournament due to injury.
The Wolfpack placed 11th out of 15 teams in Division 3 and 39th overall with 28 team points earned during the tournament. Glenwood City won Division 3 with 204.5 points, just ahead of Regis-Altoona (197) and well ahead of Clear Lake (168.5) and Phillips (124.5). Menomonie was the Division 1 and overall champion with 322.5 points, just ahead of Freedom (307.5) and Baldwin-Woodville (294). Cadott was the Division 2 champion with 256 points ahead of St. Croix Falls (235) and Marathon (181).
The Wolfpack will compete at the Cadott Invitational on Saturday. The tournament starts at 10 a.m. The team will be part of a 6 p.m. Lakeland Conference double-dual with Bruce at Turtle Lake-Clayton on Tuesday.
