MCDONALD'S SWNEWS4U.COM GAME OF THE WEEK (Jan. 2–9)
PREP WRESTLING: The Clash National High School Duals
Prairie du Chien grapplers finish second in Division Six at The Clash National High School Duals
By Derick Kelly, Courier Press
LA CROSSE — The Prairie du Chien wrestling team traveled to La Crosse for the third week in a row when they competed in The Clash National High School Wrestling Duals XXI at the La Crosse Center on Friday, Jan. 5 and Saturday, Jan. 6.
The Hawks went 3-3 over the two days to finish as runner-ups in the Division Six pool and in 22nd place overall out of 32 of the strongest teams in the country.
The Hawks opened up the two-day competition with a tough, but very competitive dual with Kenyon-Wanamingo, MN. After a back-and-forth dual that saw just three pins combined between the two teams, the K-W Knights earned a 28-26 victory over the Hawks.
The loss moved Prairie du Chien into the consolation side of Bracket A and into a meeting with their originally scheduled opponent, Rochester Mayo, MN. (brackets had to be adjusted after Joliet Catholic, IL. withdrew from the tournament two weeks ago).
This match did feature quite a few more victories by pinfall as the Hawks picked up five of them on their way to a 40-25 victory over the Spartans, who had qualified for the Minnesota Class AAA Team State Tournament last season.
In their final match of the first session on day one, the Hawks meet the replacement team for Joliet Catholic, the Marion Central Catholic Hurricanes of Woodstock, Ill. After the Hawks jumped out to a 30-14 lead, the Hurricanes won each of the final four matches via pin to win the dual meet 38-30 and send Prairie to the Division Six pool on day two with a 1-2 record alongside Jackson County Central, Minn., Apple Valley, Minn., and Glenbard North, Ill.
The Hawks opened up session one of the second day with one of two rematches from last year’s tournament with perennial Illinois powerhouse Glenbard North. Prairie came out of the gates strong, winning seven of the first nine matches to open up a 34-11 lead with four matches remaining.
The Panthers of Carol Stream, Ill. would not go away without a fight as they won the next three matches in a row, but, with the team score at 34-25 in favor of the Hawks with one match left, the Panthers could not catch the Hawks. PdC’s Drake Ingham received a forfeit victory at 133 pounds to make the final score 40-25 in favor of Prairie du Chien.
The second dual for Prairie Wrestling was also the second rematch of the day as the Hawks faced the Apple Valley Eagles, one of just two teams to have wrestled at every Clash Tournament since its inception in 2003 (the other being Vacaville, CA., who the Hawks also faced last year).
Prairie du Chien won each of the first four matches to take an early 16-0 lead before the 25 time Minnesota state champs quickly won two matches in-a-row by pin to make the score 16-12. The two teams split the next four matches, but the differences were the Hawks winning both of their matches with pins by Jack Simmons and Porter Kossman (a pin is worth 6 team points) and keeping the Eagles to just two wins by regular decision (regular decisions are worth 3 team points). Thanks to a pair of gritty efforts from Hunter Reid and Brady Baumgartner, Apple Valley was kept from earning bonus points.
Prairie earned victories from Mason Hird and Ingham in each of the next two matches to give the Hawks a 37-18 lead going into the final match. Apple Valley got a pinfall victory in the final match to make the final score 37-24 in favor of Prairie du Chien.
The Hawks headed into their final dual of the tournament with a chance to win the Division Six bracket if they were to win against fellow bracket unbeaten Jackson County Central. The Huskies of Jackson County Central won the 2023 Minnesota Class A Team State Championship over Caledonia/Houston and are also an annual mainstay of The Clash.
Despite not being at full strength as a team, the Hawks jumped out to a 10-0 lead before the Huskies came right back to win three straight matches to take a 15-10 lead. That lead was short lived. However, the Hawks quickly retook the lead 16-15 thanks to a pin from J. Simmons.
That lead was also short lived as Jackson County Central won each of the next three matches by pin to claim a 33-16 lead with four matches to go in the dual. The 17 point deficit meant the Hawks had to win each of the last four matches and pretty much all by either pin or technical fall in order to win the dual.
M. Hird and Ingham quickly delivered two pins back-to-back to make the score 33-28 with just two matches remaining. Mason Baumgartner fought valiantly against JCC’s Benjamin Dahlin but came up short in a hard fought 6-2 loss. That made the score 36-28 entering the final match, which the Huskies won by forfeit to claim the 42-28 victory over the Blackhawks.
The Hawks ended the day 2-1 and 3-3 at the tournament for the second straight year. Prairie’s three dual wins were over teams with school enrollments of 1900, 1800, and 1488 students and a combined 26 team state championships.
Prairie Wrestling was led individually by Ingham, who became the first PdC wrestler to join the tournament’s 6-0 club. Also going undefeated during the tournament was Jeremiah Avery (5-0) and Blake Thiry (3-0), while Drew Hird, Bryce Lenzendorf, and Jack Simmons all went 5-1.
The three dual wins also gave head coach Mike Rogge 96 career dual victories, which moves him past Mel Dow (94 dual wins from 2000-10) for the most dual wins by a head coach in program history.
Next up for the Hawks is a home dual with Darlington/Black Hawk on Thursday, Jan. 11 before traveling back up to La Crosse the following night to take on Baldwin-Woodville, Gale-Ettrick-Trempealeau/Melrose-Mindoro, and La Crosse Aquinas in a quad dual meet at Aquinas High School. Start time of the meet is scheduled for 4:30 p.m.
