Why I support This Team, This Coaching Staff, and the BRTC

[Wisconsin Wrestling Fan]

Team
There is quite a bit to like about this year's team. About as much quality team depth as I can remember in quite some time. Ethan Rotondo and Cole Martin have both filled in during the Big Ten season and have come away with Big Ten victories. Early in the season Jared Scharenbrock beat Coleman Hammond in a dual which helped secure the dual win. Jacob Covaciu and Mason Reinhardt are both very good and could compete well in the Big Ten. And these are the backups.

When is the last time you can remember we had this kind of depth?

6 of our wrestlers (Eli Stickley, Andrew Crone, Evan Wick, Ryan Christensen, Ricky Robertson, and Hunter Ritter are in good position to qualify for the NCAA's based on the 1st coaches panel.  All 6 are in the Top 25 at their weights, and Evan Wick and Ricky Robertson are Top 10, and Andrew Crone is Top 20. We will most likely need a big win or two at the Big Ten tournament at 125, 133, 149, and 285 to qualify at those weights. Big dual wins in February could help build the resumes of Jens Lantz and Cole Martin. A few big wins this month by our ranked wrestlers will solidify their bids.

The Coaching Staff
For me, the story of this coaching group (Barry Davis, Kyle Ruschell, Trevor Brandvold) starts in the 2011-12 season. Because of three Olympic redshirts, and limited depth, the team was not good. We could barely score any points in a dual. After Ben Jordan, we did not have much success in the dual season in the Big Ten. We qualified two to Nationals – Ben Jordan and Cole Tobin. In one of the more impressive National tournament consolation brackets, Ben Jordan won close match after close match, defeated an Iowa wrestler who had beaten him twice that year, and defeated the #3 ranked Iowa State wrestler to become an All-American. Getting an All-American that season was incredible.

What has the coaching staff done since that time?

Recruiting
Our recruiting has created more depth, has brought in more freestyle success, and great teammates that work together. To me, it feels like we truly have a team now, not a collection of individuals.

We have been recruiting in new regions while maintaining a foothold in our cores areas.  New recruits have come from California, Washington, Maryland, and Michigan. And we are maintaining our strong connections in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.

Here is a partial list of out of state recruits and their states:

Washington – Ryan Christensen, Izaec Quintanilla, Ethan Rotondo; California – Zander Wick and Evan Wick; Maryland – Hunter Ritter; Michigan – Trent Hillger

Illinois Johnny Jimenez, Ricky Robertson, Mikey Cullen; Indiana – Jacob Covaciu, Paul Konrath; Ohio – Isaac Jordan, Ryan Taylor, Eli Stickley.

For 2018 recruiting, we are getting highly ranked Wisconsin Wrestlers - Jared Krattiger, Jeremy Schoenherr, Tyler Dow. With Tyler Dow (and Garrett Model) we now have 2 recruits from Stoughton, who has turned into a powerhouse again and hopefully their best wrestlers continue to become Badgers. Also, we are getting Drew Scharenbrock from Sun Prairie and Joey Sanchez from St, Paris Graham, Ohio. A pretty solid class. Getting three big names recruits from Wisconsin in one class is impressive.

Developing Talent
Isaac Jordan became a 4X All American, and only had 1 loss as a Junior to Alex Dieringer, who was considered the best wrestler at any weight. Connor Medbery had 2 losses as a Senior, both to Kyle Snyder, considered one of the best wrestlers in the world. Tyler Graff became a 4X All-American, and lost in overtime in the NCAA finals to future World Team Member Tony Ramos. All three were outstanding. Ryan Taylor became an All-American one year, and was a Round of 12 wrestler the next year before injuries cut his career short. Ben Jordan became an All-American his Senior Year as noted previously.

Timmy McCall and Andrew Crone have both been Round of 12 wrestlers at the NCAA's. We have also had some Round of 16 wrestlers at the NCAA. Rylan Lubeck, Ricky Robertson, Ryan Christensen and Frank Cousins.

Getting 9 wrestlers to the NCAA's in 2017 was impressive. Outstanding performances by Cole Martin and Ryan Christensen at the Big Ten tournament to qualify for the NCAA's are a couple of examples of the coaching staff and the wrestlers getting the job done.

Developing Assistant Coaches
I like how Barry Davis has allowed his Assistant Coaches to grow into their positions. Hearing quotes about the team from Kyle Ruschell, Trevor Brandvold, Camden Eppert and not just Barry Davis is great. This has allowed us to hear different perspectives and helps the coaching staff grow as individuals while they are helping the team. Trevor and Kyle have both done a great job for many years. - very impressed with both of them.

Many former Wisconsin Wrestlers who achieved great success under Barry Davis are now Coaching at the D-1 Level.

Donny Pritzlaff, Rutgers
Andrew Howe, Northwestern
Travis Rutt, Iowa
Tyler Graff, Virginia Tech
Timmy McCall, North Carolina State
Isaac Jordan, Oklahoma State
Trevor Brandvold, Kyle Ruschell, Tyler Turner, Wisconsin

That is a pretty impressive coaching tree. You could add in others that Wisconsin Assistants that are now Head Coaches or Assistants elsewhere (Terry Steiner, USA Women's Coach for example) Those who wrestled for Barry and are now D1 Coaches shows the most direct influence.

Communication
Our Social Media presence is strong. We have 16,900+ Facebook followers, 13,100 Twitter followers (with over 12,000 Tweets!), 5900 Instagram followers. Our media reporting is very good – the UW Badger Website, Team Videos, WiWrestling.com articles, and Tuesdays with Barry have all helped get the word out much better than in the past.  Is it perfect? No, it's never perfect, and it can always get better, but it has taken quite a bit of effort to accomplish all of this. I appreciate all of the regular news and updates. And I think most of the fans do as well.

Results
While we have been around the middle of the pack in the Big Ten in the last few years, we have been a Top 20 team for most years when compared to all D1 teams. Rebuilding the program to that level since 2011 shows the entire coaching staff has been engaged in developing and adding talent. We are competing against great coaches and teams – it's a tough task. The Big Ten conference always has around 10 of the Top 25 teams. Do we want to do better? Yes. Can we do better? I believe we can. I like the direction the program is heading.

Barry has been a great representative of the University of Wisconsin and has had many great successes. He has the most wins and most All-Americans as a Head Coach in Wisconsin Wrestling History.  I am happy that Barry Davis is our Head Coach and appreciate all he has done for the University of Wisconsin.  

The BRTC
The Badger Wrestling Club became the Badger Regional Training Center about a year ago.

Not sure you could ask for a better representative than Tyler Turner, former Badger All-American. He is a great person, passionate about the Badgers, and really wants to help build the BRTC.

Nazar has had great success and continues to get better. Adding 2X All-American Evan Henderson from North Carolina to the mix will allow Evan and Nazar to help each other since they are both at close weight classes.  Evan has some D1 coaching experience, and brings some ACC experience to the room. Excellent addition to build the club.

We are growing the BRTC incrementally which is good but together we all can do more. Continuing to build the BRTC requires additional funding. And it is simple to do. Here is a link to donate by check or credit card:

https://www.badgerrtc.org/financial-support

We don't have to wait until the Steak Fry to donate (Although the Kalscheur steaks are pretty good!) To get involved, you can visit the main website at https://www.badgerrtc.org/

Good luck the rest of the season Badgers!

Kirk Nelson
Badger Wrestler
1983-84

P.S. I am donating to the BRTC today!

[littleguy301]

nice post!!!!!!!

thank you for doing a positive post on the Badgers!

[bigG]

Good points. We do have a nice team. Our depth is impressive; and to think of all those gents (or most) ending up with a valuable education is a sweet thought.

[Brett Favre - R.I.P.]

If you think UW is good now, wait till next year.

[bigG]

Been good every year. I know you want greatness; but it's no given. God only made so many Cael Ss, Tom Rs and John Ss. Love to see Brain Smith or Bono; but I'd bet they're pretty cozy where they are. Love to have Ben A. I'd bet the UW would consider that a bit risky. I say not guts, no glory; but maybe that's why I'm not making those calls.

Have you applied for any of the sports admin. jobs, Brett? You sure seem to know it all.

[Manty77]

Post of the year  . . . .  or decade. Way to pull all this info together and lay out such an outstanding summary.  Many of us follow the Badgers closely and know these details, but I've never seen all put together so well.  Nice job.

[bigoil]

Excellent, well needed positive post about the UW Badger Wrestling Program and RTC.

[leg turk]

excellent write up!  I do love the enthusiasm some of you have, and I wish I could be more like that at times.  The next 4 matches will tell a lot more about this team.

This team might be deeper than past teams, I don't know.  When you have a season without wrestling Iowa, Penn St, Ohio St, and Minny, I think that makes your team look better than what maybe it appears.  We shall see.

[wrastle63]

The next 4 matches will tell a lot more about this team.

For three of the four, we're looking at legitimate coin flips. Because the best wrestler typically wins, there are very few dual meets where the outcome is unknown. With these four (three of them, at least), the outcome is very much unknown. How exciting is that? I'm taking in both Friday duals live (Nebraska & Rutgers), and I can't wait.

I'm going to ask this right now. Maybe it's asking too much. Let's be intelligent fans about how we discuss the results.

If one team doesn't bring a full roster out there, for whatever reason, let's acknowledge that it isn't a true result. I mean that both ways. If Nebraska sits Isaiah White to duck Evan, let's know we didn't beat Nebraska at full strength. Likewise if we sit Evan, in either of this high profile showdowns this weekend, and lose by the couple points he might have saved going the distance with Martinez or White. Let's acknowledge the matches where both teams were at full strength, while noting where teams were less than that.

(I hope we don't, but I've found examples of at least six Big Ten teams ducking matches at this point. It happens, despite me wishing otherwise. Until duals mean more, there's not much we as fans can do.)

Just a little caveat there. Duals don't really matter, which means teams don't always go full-out to try to win them.

But even if you lose a dual by a couple points it doesn't mean your team is horrible like some on here think. This is the Big Ten and almost every team is ranked in the top 20. Look at Rutgers they sat almost half of their starting lineup against Illinois. If Barry would have done that people would have tried to hang him.

[Badgerdad]

I am going to discuss the Badger wresting family from a different perspective. I am a parent of a current Wisconsin Badger wrestler. My son was fortunate to have quite a few options so we had to make sure we organized our questions to the schools/coaches and his unofficial visits were taken seriously. Most importantly our son wanted a school that would offer the academic major he was interested in. He was looking for a coaching staff that were men of integrity and had the ability of helping him grow as wrestler. Also important was the hopes he could find a program that is competitive.
When the official visits were used up and and the questions were answered, Wisconsin was the last school standing. I have seen a lot of negative on this forum that is expressing their interest in making a coaching change. Those of you that have that sentiment obviously have not gone through the same process that my family has been through. If I were to die today, I am confident that the present coaching staff could and would encourage my son to grow up to be a man of integrity, respecting others, and treating his future wife appropriately. I am confident that these current coaches will help him obtain his individual wrestling goals. Finally, because of their expectations of the type of student athlete they are looking for, the challenges are greater to find the right fit for the Badger program then it may be at other academic institutions. With this said, I am of the belief that these next few seasons may prove that the last couple recruiting classes will make this Badger team very competitive in the near future. Although my son LOVES the campus and what it has to offer academically, he would be real hesitant to stay if this current coaching staff was to be replaced.
In reality there is much more to competing in athletics at the college level then just winning and the coaches responsibilities run much deeper as well.
I'm curious to know how many of these folks posting on this forum actually support the wrestling team by going to the dual meets or donating.

[billymurphy]

Nobody is disputing that Barry runs a clean program and that the UW is a great academic school, so that is a lot to offer and nobody can question your choice.
However, in a pure wrestling standpoint, Iowa develops their wrestlers to the point where they can become one of the top guys in the
country where the Badgers take a high school recruit from Wisconsin, with about the same high school ranking as the Iowa recruit, and two years later I
see that Iowa kid ranked 8th in the country and wrestling on the BTN with a large fanbase and the Badger recruit not ranked in the top 20 and putting up mediocre results.
I can't use Penn State as an example since they are on a completely different level.  With just dumb luck you would think that in the 20+ years Barry Davis has
been coaching at Wisconsin that at least one Wisconsin high school wrestler would have won a title at Wisconsin.   

[wrastle63]

Nobody is disputing that Barry runs a clean program and that the UW is a great academic school, so that is a lot to offer and nobody can question your choice.
However, in a pure wrestling standpoint, Iowa develops their wrestlers to the point where they can become one of the top guys in the
country where the Badgers take a high school recruit from Wisconsin, with about the same high school ranking as the Iowa recruit, and two years later I
see that Iowa kid ranked 8th in the country and wrestling on the BTN with a large fanbase and the Badger recruit not ranked in the top 20 and putting up mediocre results.
I can't use Penn State as an example since they are on a completely different level.  With just dumb luck you would think that in the 20+ years Barry Davis has
been coaching at Wisconsin that at least one Wisconsin high school wrestler would have won a title at Wisconsin.   

Well this goes to JW point that Wisconsin overall has been very bad as a state compared to other state. So a 4x state champ from Wisconsin wasn't the same thing as  4x state champ from Iowa. I feel like we are improving as a state, but not to Iowa, Pennsylvania, etc. level yet.

[bigG]

Nowhere even close to MN & IL. Man has roughly the same population as us; but they sure put out a lot more. Wrestling is not very popular in Wisconsin; and it seems to still be on the decline.

Iowa and MN develop those guys way before they step on the college mats. They have the popularity to drive wrestling. The crowds weren't a rollin' in before BD became coach. I went to quite a few during Hellickson's reign. Some good (when IA was in town) some every bit as ho-hum as currently. We're a fair weather wrestling state. Get a few champion caliber guys and the numbers job. Couple less and forget it.

Many on here think WI is a much more wrestling friendly state than it.

And, I'll hand it to Ben. He wants us to be one of those states. I'm sure BD want the infectious Iowa way to catch on here. Sounds like some are looking more for a magician than a coach.

[Barou]

Nobody is disputing that Barry runs a clean program and that the UW is a great academic school, so that is a lot to offer and nobody can question your choice.
However, in a pure wrestling standpoint, Iowa develops their wrestlers to the point where they can become one of the top guys in the
country where the Badgers take a high school recruit from Wisconsin, with about the same high school ranking as the Iowa recruit, and two years later I
see that Iowa kid ranked 8th in the country and wrestling on the BTN with a large fanbase and the Badger recruit not ranked in the top 20 and putting up mediocre results.
I can't use Penn State as an example since they are on a completely different level.  With just dumb luck you would think that in the 20+ years Barry Davis has
been coaching at Wisconsin that at least one Wisconsin high school wrestler would have won a title at Wisconsin.   

Well this goes to JW point that Wisconsin overall has been very bad as a state compared to other state. So a 4x state champ from Wisconsin wasn't the same thing as  4x state champ from Iowa. I feel like we are improving as a state, but not to Iowa, Pennsylvania, etc. level yet.

Nobody believes WI HS wrestling is more than what it is.  Davis gets criticized for not keeping the best ones in state.  The guys that win national titles and Hodges.

[lizard king]

Bottom line, the head coach is responsible for the program.  This has been said on here many times.  Great coaches have turned programs around (PSU), poor coaches have turned programs other ways (Iowa).   Everyone has a view of what they want from the Badgers, if my son were wrestling I would want a coach that would make him great, and help instill the values WE taught him, but everyone can't go to PSU.

If you like what the badgers are doing, great, support the head coach.  If you want something different, great, don't support the head coach. I personally think you wrestle DI to win.  If you want a nice program with a great education, and a coach that helps teach values and personal skills, wrestle DIII, there are many outstanding programs.