Facing some of its toughest competition of the season this past week, Coach Dale Bonge said his Boone Central/Newman Grove wrestlers were competitive and showed solid improvement.
Boone Central/Newman Grove began with a second-place effort in the Aurora Quad Tuesday, Jan. 7. The host Huskies won the competition with 173 points, followed by BC/NG (141), Cozad (119) and Elkhorn (49).
“It was a good test against other Class B schools,” Bonge commented. “Cozad is rated #6 – it was nice to place ahead of them. Their high rating is based on a few highly-ranked wrestlers. We put together our most complete team to date and, due to everybody contributing to the team scoring by placing third or higher, managed to get past them.”
The Cardinals had four meet champions in Nolan Wondercheck, Joel Meyer, Jackson Meyer and Scott Joe. Steven Arreguin, Cody Shanno and Ethan Wilke were runners-up.
In one of the biggest, strongest fields of team Boone Central/Newman Grove will face, the Cardinals placed 13th in the annual High Plains Invitational at Columbus Jan. 10-11.
The Cardinals scored 70 points and were just 10 points from cracking the meet’s top ten. Omaha North won the event with 217.5 points, followed by David City (175.5) and Adams Central (169.5).
“The High Plains Invite was up to 22 teams this year and loaded with talent,” Bonge noted. “There were no less than six top ten teams, Classes A through D, represented. Add to that around 40 top six rated wrestlers, including a dozen ranked #1, and some great wrestling was bound to take place over a big two-day tournament.
“Our guys continued to show improvement and competed well in such a loaded field to get a middle-of-the-pack finish. To make it to the second day of this tournament and be in the top eight of your weight class, wrestlers had to finish in the top two of their pool.
“Six of our ten young men accomplished that feat.”
Nolan Wondercheck (5-2) and Jackson Meyer (4-2) led the Cardinals with third-place tournament finishes. Steven Arreguin and Jacob Krings each went 3-3 to place sixth.
Complete results in Print & Online editions of Albion News
