Badger conference/incoming freshman?thoughts on returning wrestlers

[boowrestle]

who are some of the incoming freshman that may be in the mix come tournament time?Thoughts on returning wrestlers.Baraboo has a light group of freshman but quite a bit of varsity experience(badger placewinners coming back).3 conference finalists(1 champ),leading the way,all 3 plan to return at same wt as last season.Team wise in the north,Sauk is going to be tough to beat.

[kyle b]

Well I do know that Milton will have a couple of talented kids in the lower weights, around 106-120.  I know Stoughton has some more incoming freshman who are very talented. I think Sauk Prairie is going to be the class of the conference.  They only lost 2 wrestlers and return 12 kids who went to sectionals, pending everyone returns.

It wouldn't surprise me if Sauk won state this year.  Other teams in State Title contention: Pulaski, Bay Port, Kaukauna, Rapids.  And I think a Dark Horse pick to win it all: Menomonie.

[CLC FAN]

No disrespect, but I would be floored if Sauk Prairie won team state this year.  I'll give you that they are going to be a top team, but I think you place way too much emphasis on being a sectional qualifier.  Taking 3rd or 4th in an 8-man bracket at regionals does not indicate much.  Taking 4th or better in an 8-man bracket at sectionals does give a good indication of a high-quality wrestler.  Bringing back 12 will help Sauk Prairie, but lets look at the D1 Contenders you list:

Sauk Praire:  12 returning, 12 sectional qualifers, 4 state qualifiers (one 5th, one 6th).  Of the other 8 sectional qualifiers returning, one 4th place finish at sectionals.

Rapids:  10 returning, 9 sectional qualifiers, 2 state qualifiers (no placewinners).  Of the other 7 sect. qualifiers, 2 of them took 3rd - so one match from state.

Menomonie:  13 returning, 12 sectional qualifiers, 1 state qualifier (did not place)  Of the other 11 sect. qualifiers, 2 of them took 3rd.

Bay Port: 10 returning, 8 sectional qualifiers, 5 state qualifiers (one 3rd, one 4th, one 6th)  Of the other 3 sect. qualifiers, one 3rd and one 4th.

Pulaski:  12 returning, 11 sectional qualifiers, 5 state qualifiers (one 2nd).  Of the other 6 sect. qualifiers, two of them took 4th.

Kaukauna:  11 returning, 11 sectional qualifiers, 6 state qualifiers (one 2nd, one 3rd)  Of the other 5 sect qualifiers, 3 took 3rd and one took 4th.



So Kaukauna has 9 kids who either placed at state, qualified for state, or were one match from qualifying.  The next closest team on that list had 6 (looking at you Bay Port).

[bkraus]

No disrespect, but I would be floored if Sauk Prairie won team state this year.  I'll give you that they are going to be a top team, but I think you place way too much emphasis on being a sectional qualifier.  Taking 3rd or 4th in an 8-man bracket at regionals does not indicate much.  Taking 4th or better in an 8-man bracket at sectionals does give a good indication of a high-quality wrestler.  Bringing back 12 will help Sauk Prairie, but lets look at the D1 Contenders you list:

Sauk Praire:  12 returning, 12 sectional qualifers, 4 state qualifiers (one 5th, one 6th).  Of the other 8 sectional qualifiers returning, one 4th place finish at sectionals.

Rapids:  10 returning, 9 sectional qualifiers, 2 state qualifiers (no placewinners).  Of the other 7 sect. qualifiers, 2 of them took 3rd - so one match from state.

Menomonie:  13 returning, 12 sectional qualifiers, 1 state qualifier (did not place)  Of the other 11 sect. qualifiers, 2 of them took 3rd.

Bay Port: 10 returning, 8 sectional qualifiers, 5 state qualifiers (one 3rd, one 4th, one 6th)  Of the other 3 sect. qualifiers, one 3rd and one 4th.

Pulaski:  12 returning, 11 sectional qualifiers, 5 state qualifiers (one 2nd).  Of the other 6 sect. qualifiers, two of them took 4th.

Kaukauna:  11 returning, 11 sectional qualifiers, 6 state qualifiers (one 2nd, one 3rd)  Of the other 5 sect qualifiers, 3 took 3rd and one took 4th.



So Kaukauna has 9 kids who either placed at state, qualified for state, or were one match from qualifying.  The next closest team on that list had 6 (looking at you Bay Port).

Good research this early.  I'm impressed!

[Grant Peissig]

Very interesting discussion.  I appreciate the compliment Kyle, but I wish you wouldn't have let the cat out of the bag, I was kind of hoping that we could fly under the radar for a while 

CLC, I like reading your posts because your research is top notch.  The stats you have come up with gives a pretty good gauge of where a team is at coming into the season.  One thing that would make your numbers even more accurate is if there was a way to factor in the strength of each sectional when evaluating how many returning state qualifiers a team has.  I have always wanted to get a hold of Justin Tritz and ask him to keep a "Team" score for each sectional at individual state.  It would be pretty simple, All 28 qualifiers from each sectional can contribute to their sectional team points.  Everyone always seems to think that their sectional is the toughest in the state, by keeping a team score it would settle the argument fair and square. 

As for the discussion on State title contenders I think you are missing a big one.  Arnie has a goup of Merrill kids that are going to be able to bring it.  Look at their returning wrestlers in the upper weights.  Reinhardt, Pophal, Hintze, Klug, and Schmidt are as tough as it gets up top and they have some solid guys in the lower weights lead by Scott Arneson.

Here is my top 5 as of now...

1.) Kaukauna - State runner up last year with a young team.  Absolutely stacked in the lower weights.  It will be interesting to see if some of their guys got bigger this off season so they can get all their talent in the lineup.

2.) Bay Port - Took Wausau West to the wire in the state semi finals last year.  Lose some studs to graduation, but bring back plenty of hammers.  I don't see this program taking a step back any time soon.

3.) Merrill - They look like the best team in the Wisconsin Valley Conference and, based on history, that makes you a front runner in the team state race.

4.) Sauk Prairie - Came on really strong in the 2nd half of the season last year and made an impressive run to the state semis.  Bringing back a lot of quality wrestlers.  They should have a very balanced lineup from top to bottom.

5.) Holmen - Could have put a few different teams here.  I will go with the Vikings because they have 3 returning state placewinners and 2 more state qualifiers.  They lost alot of their middle weights, but my guess is Lulloff has some quality wrestlers waiting in the wings.

Other Teams that I would consider contenders: Pulaski, Wisconsin Rapids, Stevens Point, Burlington, Port Washington (would have been #5 if Deiringer was still there), Hudson, Wausau West, Menomonee Falls, and of course I have to include our guys here in Menomonie.  I think we've got a great group that can compete with anyone in the state.  It will be fun to see how it all plays out!
 

[CLC FAN]

I like your rankings Grant... I was not trying to exclude anyone in my post - I was just breaking down the teams Kyle had listed as contenders. 

As far as your strength of sectional line of reasoning goes, this is a huge factor in evaluating a team's strength.  Taking 3rd at sectionals where the #1 and #2 guys both place at state means something quite different than taking third to two guys who both get knocked out first round.  A few years ago Koy Kosek published The Wisconsin Wrestling Digest for wrestling/ stats nerds and the general population.  One of his key metrics was APS - average place at state.  You add up all the places earned by kids from a given sectional and divide by 28 to find how the average wrestler coming out of that given sectional would do.  Those who don't place are assigned 11.5th place (they are between the 7th and 16th best in the bracket...  (7+16)/2 =11.5)  I really support this as a truer indicator of how strong a sectional is.  If you have a Thielke who techs/pins his way through finals, he would skew a sectionals point total way out of whack, when really he only contributes to the toughness of one weight class.  Anyway, since Koy stopped publishing in 2008, I've kept track of APS by sectional.  In DI last year the sectionals went

Toughest:  Sectional A  (Wausau West, Menomonie et al) APS 6.59
2nd:  Sectional E  (Badger, Mount Horeb, et al)  APS 7.5
3rd:  Sectional C  (Sauk Prairie, Holmen, et al)  APS 8.5
4th:  Sectional D  (Kaukana, Oshkosh West, et al)  APS 8.57
5th:  Sectional B  (Bay Port, Rapids et al)  APS  8.84
6th:  (tied) Sectional G  (Menomonee Falls, Tosa West/East)  APS 9.29
6th: (tied) Sectional H  (Burlington, South Milwaukee et al)  APS 9.29
8th:  Sectional F  (Mukwonago, West Allis Central et al)  APS 9.43

An average DI sectional APS is 8.5, so you can see that Sectional A and E were quite a bit better than average, but the rest were just a little bit below and VERY bunched up.  In fact, it's unusual that no sectional had an APS higher than 9.5... since 2007 that's never happened!  As most people would probably agree, D1 was very even last year with a lot of teams all bunched up after the top 3 or 4.

[Troy Grindle]

Barring any major injuries this year I wouldn't be surprised if Sauk won state either.  One of the Powells didn't even wrestle the second half of the season and they still made it to the state semi's.  They are going to be one of the most balanced teams in the state this year.  Hopefully all of their kids don't bunch up at the same weights.

[MAGMA]

It is to bad Sauk and Holmen have to wrestle in team sectionals-they are probably going to be 2 of the top 5 teams in state this year.

[kyle b]

CLC fan yeah I'm probably putting too much emphasis on sectional qualifiers but I also looked at which weights graduated from each team.  Kaukauna is a very good team but I think it will be harder for them to replace 182, 195, and 220.  I think its easier to replace the low to middle weights than the heavy ones.  Maybe they have excellent kids waiting in the wings, so I guess we'll see when the season begins.

[Ino]

They look like the best team in the Wisconsin Valley Conference and, based on history, that makes you a front runner in the team state race.

Good point, in the 22 years of the team state tournament there have been 26 finalist from the Wisconsin Valley Conference with 20 winning the championship. Rapids gets most of the credit with 16, but it also includes 2 x champs Merrill and Wausau West plus DC Everest was the runner up in 1994.

http://www.wiaawi.org/Portals/0/PDF/Results/Wrestling/State%20Records/teamchamps.pdf

So is 2014 the year they are not in it?

The draw for this year is:
Division 1

[CLC FAN]

This is probably the wrong thread for this but be that as it may...  my D1 Team State bracket for this year looks like

Merrill
                               Merrill
Mukwonago

                                                   Merrill

Pulaski
                               Pulaski
Badger

                                                                       Kaukuana

Holmen
                               Holmen
Burlington

                                                    Kaukuana

Kaukauna
                              Kaukuana
Tosa West/East

[CLC FAN]

Also... great digging into the stats Ino!  20 D1 titles for the Wisconsin Valley conference in 22 years.  Wow!


Kyle b,  point taken about the location of Kaukauna's losses.  I think losing at either fringe hurts more than losing a mid-weight, and losing an upper weight probably hurts a good program more than losing a lower weight. 

Finally... I really hope I'm not coming across as anti- Sauk Prairie with my comments or the bracket predictions I just posted.  I have nothing but the utmost respect for their team and coaching staff.  I expect their team sectional dual against Holmen to be the best battle in DI (maybe in any division) on that Tuesday after regionals.  Can't wait for the season!!

[kyle b]

nothing is off topic when its about wrestling.  I'm glad to be talking about any part of the upcoming season...... But to get back to the topic , another badger conference team we should be looking out for: Deforest.  Always tough and they bring back a pretty solid lineup. 

[kyle b]

and are all the teams in the in the same regionals as last year?

[Ino]

and are all the teams in the in the same regionals as last year?

http://www.wiaawi.org/Portals/0/PDF/Results/Wrestling/2014/assignments.pdf