HUSKERLAND UPDATE - April 2003

Huskerland 18 Message from the State Director Craig Hellwege

The one theme that overrode everything else was that the UNK venue along with mat setup was clearly the best that Huskerland has every had. The search to find a home for Huskerland we feel is over! The Huskerland board wants to extend a very big thank you to Marc Bauer, his staff, and the UNK wrestlers for everything they did to make Huskerland 18 so special for everyone. The second theme being stated was how smooth and fast every session went. My thanks to Fred Hall who appears to be doing a fine job growing into the Meet Director's position. This was the third Huskerland Fred has directed and he has really taken charge of the event.

Seventeen clubs took home plaques from the 2003 Huskerland State Meet and four other clubs just missed plaques by one point. Congratulations to Fremont, Westside, Millard South, Duncan, Valentine, and Nebraska City for bringing home state championship plaques. Fremont repeated in Class AA and now holds the record with 6 straight state championship plaques. Millard South won Class B and now has four straight titles. Westside won Class A in taking home their second Huskerland title. Duncan repeated in Class C and now has four Huskerland crowns but had to share this one with Valentine who brought home their first Huskerland title. Nebraska City took home the Class D plaque and Huskerland title number eight. Class C provided the most fireworks as Beatrice was just one point away from making it a 3 way tie for the title and Kearney Catholic finished just one point behind them. Three other clubs finished in third place by just one point. They were Plattsmouth in Class A, Nebraska Extreme in Class B, and Norfolk Catholic in Class C. The runner-up plaques were the first Huskerland plaques for the Lincoln Thunderbolts, Central City, and Boone Central. Lincoln Wrestling Club finished second in Class AA. TTT Plaques were awarded to Norfolk in Class A, Auburn-Peru & Lexington in Class B, Syracuse in Class C, and Clarks & Sargent in Class D.

The four wrestlers going for six all won their brackets plus their Champions of Champions match. Chad Brester of Fremont joined his brother as a six time champ. Greg Garcia of Millard South became their club's second six time champ. Bernie Nicola of Fremont and Andy Prokorny of Omaha Westside became just the fourth and fifth Six Time Champion of Champions. Eight other wrestlers won their fifth Huskerland state title. They are James Belville of Valentine, Mitchell Brown of Millard South, Taylor Escamilla of Fremont, Austin Hergott of Norfolk Catholic, Mathew May of Chase County, Colby McCord of Louisville, Daniel Rodriguez of Kearney Mat Cats, and Tyler Shanahan of Fremont.

Plans are under way for Huskerland 19 to be back in the UNK Health and Sports Center on April 9th and 10th next year We are planning to run Grades 7-8 on Friday with sessions starting at 11 am and 3 pm. Grades 5-6 will have session starts at 8:30 am and 11:30 am on Saturday. Rounding out Saturday's action will be Grades 3-4 with sessions starting at 2:30 pm and 5:30 pm. Our taped on circles worked well but we plan to have a layout with six Dollumar mats in the center area. The six center mats will have circles touching but this setup will have us using the painted on circles for all ten mats.

Craig craigh@huskerland.org

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