Youth teams needed

benaskren · November 14, 2016, 02:17:48 PM

Hey everyone we are hosting youth duals at our AWA Winter Classic, we have both an ELITE division and LOCAL division. We already have 10 elite 5th-8th grade teams, but only 3 Local 5th-8th grade and 2 local 2nd-5th grade teams. We need some more teams to populate those divisions.

Here is the link with all of the information, please email me ben@awawisconsin.com if you have questions.

benaskren · December 12, 2016, 11:48:29 AM

Just a bump to the top, still looking for teams in the local division. Please shoot me a message if interested.

Thanks

ChargerDad · December 12, 2016, 12:25:37 PM

Disappointing that there aren't more local teams stepping up to enter.. kids wrestling in a dual format tournament is an awesome experience for the kids. I would see it as a huge opportunity to build comradery on a youth team and expose them to the differences between wrestling for yourself and for your team.

padre · December 12, 2016, 02:27:29 PM

Unfortunately a lot of the top tier kids are committing to these tournaments early with club teams especially in the older age group and school coaches are seeing no point in getting a school team without their top kids. I hope that changes but that's not the direction we are headed.

bigoil · December 12, 2016, 10:17:55 PM

We have a MS ind. tournament that weekend but love the concept as we are in two dual tournaments. Kids love it, very exciting.

ChargerDad · December 13, 2016, 06:13:12 AM

Quote from: padre on December 12, 2016, 02:27:29 PM
Unfortunately a lot of the top tier kids are committing to these tournaments early with club teams especially in the older age group and school coaches are seeing no point in getting a school team without their top kids. I hope that changes but that's not the direction we are headed.

I get that, my son has been on those kinds of teams, but if my school coach says we are going to a dual tournament there is no question we are wrestling for the school team. My philosophy has always been our school is who we wrestle for, an elite club is where we train some to get great partners and another great set of coaches eyes.. Elite clubs play an important role in developing the wrestlers of Wisconsin, but for us, they aren't who we represent.

wrastle63 · December 13, 2016, 01:13:19 PM

Some people don't view it as you do though. They choose club over their school that is what Padre is getting at.

padre · December 13, 2016, 01:47:25 PM

Its a Catch 22 for a lot of these kids. I know most of the large club coaches have no issue with kids going and competing with their school teams. Where there becomes an issue is when a couple fathers run a team under that club's name or a made up name and they pressure other parents/kids very early in the season....maybe even during the summer to wrestle on their team. The question is never asked if their school planned to participate or had something going on that weekend..

If their school never had any intention of doing these types of meets then its great for these kids to get these duals. Teams I know like Casco, Wrightstown, Coleman, Kaukauna and some other great ones that have kids that wrestle on these teams but in the end always wrestle for their school first....which I think should be a coaching staffs emphasis right from day 1 when kids enter their program.

littleguy301 · December 14, 2016, 11:58:04 AM

I think it is a great idea.

the problem in my neck of the woods is only a few schools have started their respect middle school and youth seasons.

Up here many start after the 1st and go through the end of march.

babywhales · December 14, 2016, 12:08:56 PM

WE are from a smaller program. We tried for 2 years to create club level dual team. We simply could not. The quality of the teams attending the extremely limited duals available in Wisconsin created a scenario where our club could not fill weights and a good number of the wrestlers we had would actually get killed.

As a result, joining a private gym or creating a team are your only alternatives.

In the past year I have seen club level duals pop up, example not limited to Riverdale February 12 and Mineral Point December 29. These do not have fixed weights and take more of a middle school approach, so the format allows the clubs to bring a full roster of 30-50 kids with preset up matches for everyone. Full mats, 3-5 matches per wrestler, team centric, no parents mat side.

I am hoping more of these appear in the upcoming years.

Here in Portage we are currently considering hosting a club dual

Our club will attending Riverdale and will be looking to attend more next year.

littleguy301 · December 14, 2016, 12:14:23 PM

We do a small club dual in Feb. Just match kids up like middle school and go from there. It seems to work pretty good.

benaskren · December 14, 2016, 01:02:20 PM

Hey guys I wanted to chime in as well.

We have 12 5th-8th grade elite dual teams and 4 elite 2nd-5th grade teams locked in.

I have a goal to get to 8 teams in each age division for the local division as well. As of now we have 4 committed in the 5th-8th and 3 in the 2nd-5th. That being said many more have expressed interest in doing so, but have not fully committed yet. I think after people see how much fun this is the 1st year then we will have more wanting to join for the 2nd year.

Hope to see all of you there
Ben