Wolfpack’s Person, Duellman get to conference wrestling finals

LAKELAND WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS

Braeden Person and Troy Duellman got to the championship matches in their weight classes, while Preston Fredrickson got to the third-place match in his for the Cornell-Gilman-Lake Holcombe wrestling co-op at Saturday’s Lakeland Conference tournament in Shell Lake.

Duellman finished second at 145 pounds for the second straight year and, once again, it was Clear Lake’s Tyler Sunday that got in his way.

Sunday, who had just beaten Duellman 7-0 on Jan. 31, improved to 41-2 for the year by winning a much tighter match this time around. Sunday edged Duellman 6-4 in Saturday’s championship for his third victory of the year over the Gilman junior. Sunday got an 8-6 overtime win over Duellman in the Dec. 10 Barron Invitational. Sunday also pinned Duellman in last year’s Lakeland Conference final in 5:43.

Duellman (21-5) won two matches to get to the 145-pound championship. He pinned Flambeau’s Bradyn Reisner in 1:45 in the quarterfinals and Unity’s Tanner Freer (17-17) in the semifinals.

Person was looking to defend his 2022 championship at 152 pounds. The Gilman senior got a bye into the semifinals, where he pinned Clear Lake’s Blake Harris (15-14) in 3:13. Person also beat Harris 11-1 on Jan. 31.

The win put Person (25-11) into the championship match against Unity’s Jack Ross (14-8), who pulled off a bit of an upset by pinning Person in 3:58.

Fredrickson (14-17) went 1-2 during the tournament at 132 pounds. He got off to a good start, pinning Clear Lake’s Rowan Ellison (14-21) in 5:10 to advance to the semifinals. There he ran into topseeded Adrien Olson, a 28-10 freshman from Unity, who pinned him in 2:50. Fredrickson was defeated by Shell Lake sophomore Tanner Bandoli (24-10) 9-4 in the third-place bout. Turtle Lake-Clayton senior Mason Quade (20-11) pinned Olson in the final in 5:01.

The three Wolfpack wrestlers combined for 49 team points and put Cornell-Gilman-Lake Holcombe seventh out of eight teams in the final standings. Flambeau was behind the Wolfpack with 37 points.

Clear Lake won the team championship with 232 points, easily outscoring the Luck Co-op (171), Unity (165), Turtle Lake-Clayton (113), Shell Lake (99) and Bruce (56.5).

The Wolfpack now heads to WIAA Division 3 post-season competition, which will not be easy. The Wolfpack’s road starts Saturday at the Edgar super regional, where the top four wrestlers in each weight class and the top two teams will advance to sectional competition.

The 13-team tournament starts at 10 a.m. and includes eighth-ranked Glenwood City, Cadott, Stratford, Spring Valley-Elmwood, Boyceville, Athens, Auburndale, Edgar, Durand, Marathon, Mc-Donell Central and Thorp/Owen-Withee.

The individual sectional is back in Edgar on Saturday, Feb. 18. The team sectional is Tuesday in Cadott.