Coleman, Storandt, Larson finish dual tourney with perfect records
By Dan Truttschel
Correspondent
For whatever reason, the East Troy High School wrestling team seems to be a bit of a slow starter.
But when it comes to the finish, the Trojans usually find a way to be right where they need to be.
That was the situation East Troy found itself it last week at the two-day Northern Exposure Dual Tournament at Merrill, as the Trojans put their two best matches of the event together at the end to finish 4-3 overall.
East Troy was 1-2 in pool play, as it defeated the Grizzlies (a team comprised of wrestlers from other schools who were not in the varsity lineup), 45-30, but fell, 48-29, to Two Rivers (ranked 10th in Division 2) and 42-33 to Mineral Point. In the consolation round, the Trojans defeated Rosholt, 54-21, and Menomonie, 40-24, to finish out the first day.
The second day was similar, as the Trojans lost, 51-27 to Merrill, but beat Marquette (Mich.), 48-28 in the tournament finale.
“We are slow starters, so we definitely wrestled our best the end of each day,” East Troy coach Mike Howard said. “So we definitely did not wrestle our best against Two Rivers to start out the first day or Merrill to start out the second day.
“But we wrestled our best the final dual of each day against Menomonie and Marquette. Being a young team, it is sometimes hard to start fast, and we certainly did not draw the weight class to start the match where we are experienced. But the kids responded after a tough dual and bounced back to wrestle considerably better after a loss.”
As usually is the case in wrestling, the difference between a win and a loss in a dual setting came down to pins, Howard said.
And when the Trojans lost during the tournament that seemed to play a pretty significant role.
“We had our chances against each team, but we gave up some costly pins,” Howard said. “We have yet to be at full strength with everyone in the lineup. Once we are, we will have a better opportunity going forward.
“Giving up a pin in a dual meet when we are winning can be a 12-point swing in the dual score. I thought we were a match or two away from beating Two Rivers and Mineral Point.”
Trio leads the way
Finishing with perfect 7-0 records for the tournament were Chase Coleman (160), Chris Storandt (220) and Tommy Larson (113).
Coleman had six pins and a major decision, Storandt had five pins (four in the first period) and Larson two pins and two major decisions, both against state-ranked opponents.
“Chase had a nice tournament,” Howard said. “He started getting back to the Chase of old with a physically dominating, attack style about him. He beat a kid from Menomonie that had beaten him last year, so that was nice. He was certainly on the attack all week.”
The story with Storandt was similar, Howard said.
“Chris certainly dominated the entire two days and imposed his will the entire time,” Howard said. “There was no one that gave him the least bit of trouble. He got his leg attacks going, which was nice.”
Larson, who moved into the 113-pound weight class for his second match, battled through a hand injury to put together a solid tournament, Howard said.
“You could tell that his hand was bothering him, but he continued to win and wrestle through the injury,” he said. “Once he is 100 percent, he will continue to dominate.”
Other top records for the Trojans were posted by Jacob Price (195), 6-1; Joe Moede (120), 6-1; Jake Dessart (170), 5-2; and John Veselka (145), 5-2.
