Strength of division 3 this year

[mrv]

Thought is was quite amazing seeing division 3 schools performing so well at all the major tournaments last week.

Cheesehead:
Fenimore places right behind  #2 Mukwanago and ahead of #1 Stoughton, #3 Kaukauna along with a number of other D1 ranked schools

Oshkosh on the Water:
Coleman #1 by a huge margin

Northern Badger:
Saint Croix Falls #1

Bi-State:
Stratford #2, behind #1AAA Stillwater, MN

[ramjet]

Agreed it's exciting

[mrv]

Here's the amazing thing is their enrollment:
Fennimore 231
Stratford 306
Coleman 220
Saint Croix Falls 332

That's a combined enrollment of 1089. a below average D1 enrollment.

[ocwrestler]

As someone from a very large D1 school 2000+ kids, I give those schools huge respect. How they can do that year after year is amazing.

[Army Ant]

Agreed that there are a lot of great wrestlers at the D3 level. Just not nearly as much depth as D1 or D2. For example, if you look at the state tournament, a lot of the top guys are pretty even with the top guys in D1. I think there is more separation though as you get to the lower-ranked kids in the brackets. A lot of it simply has to do with all the empty weight classes that some of these schools have.

[bigG]

I've just noticed more participation from even the middle of the road programs that are moving up. Many weaker schools are coming close to filling most weights.

[CoachZ]

Cadott has a solid team as well. Not sure what they placed at Northern Badger.

[padre]

It seems pretty clear cut that this year Division 3 is better than Division 2, at least at the top.

Apparently you're not familiar with the Wrightstown sectional. 😭😭

Lots of great kids will not be making the trip to Madison from there.

[imnofish]

I don't have any data to back this up (because I'm too lazy to look for it), but could the difference be that Division 3 schools have fewer sports and other activities competing for students' attention?  Maybe it's just as simple as fewer student options. 

[ChargerDad]

It seems pretty clear cut that this year Division 3 is better than Division 2, at least at the top.

Apparently you're not familiar with the Wrightstown sectional. 😭😭

Lots of great kids will not be making the trip to Madison from there.

I don't get it.

I get that geographically, some of the best D2 schools are grouped, but what does that have to do with Division 2's Top Teams vis-a-vis Division 3's Top Teams?

At the Cheesehead, Fennimore had 402.5 points. Wrightstown had 138 points.

Wrightstown had 8 wrestlers at the cheesehead for whatever reason, and it just wasn't their hammers, and it wasn't all their hammers.  Hard to make much of that score as big of a difference as it was..

[padre]

It seems pretty clear cut that this year Division 3 is better than Division 2, at least at the top.

Apparently you're not familiar with the Wrightstown sectional. 😭😭

Lots of great kids will not be making the trip to Madison from there.

I don't get it.

I get that geographically, some of the best D2 schools are grouped, but what does that have to do with Division 2's Top Teams vis-a-vis Division 3's Top Teams?

At the Cheesehead, Fennimore had 402.5 points. Wrightstown had 138 points.

Wrightstown did not have a lot of their team there I saw.  That also doesn't matter all that much for how strong a sectional is.  Random Lake, Ellsworth and some others have dominated their sectionals over the last two decades because they have just always been the best team in the area for a long time.  The depth at a sectional like Wrightstown far outweighs having a few studs at a sectional where one team generally dominates it.  When the smoke clears and everyone is down to their weights take a survey and then say D3 is better than D2 this year.

We have gone up and down and when in D3 have been in what most would say was by far the toughest D3 sectional overall(that could change this year).  There is absolutely no argument where we would like to be year after year...and thats not in the Wrightstown sectional.

We have dualed Coleman this year and they were awesome at the OTW but they would have an awful hard time beating Wrightstown once they are at full strength.

[sled77]

Cadott has a solid team as well. Not sure what they placed at Northern Badger.

Cadott finished 2nd overall at the Northern Badger (just 8.5 points out) in spite of missing 2 starters, including a state placer from last year.  I believe they are at full strength now.  But as they say, you gotta dance with who you brung.

[scfcat]

It's going to be quite a regional with Cadott and Stratford.