Knight wrestlers ‘Clash’ with nation’s best

After two days of grueling wrestling competition, the St. Michael-Albertville wrestling team placed 8th out of 32-teams in “The Clash” dual meet wrestling tournament at Rochester Community College Jan. 1 and 2.
The Knights won 3 duals and lost 3 duals in one of the nation’s toughest high school wrestling tournaments. Two of the dual meet wins for STMA were against nationally ranked teams from Missouri and Illinois.
Day one saw the Knights defeat Rio Rancho High School of New Mexico by a score of 51-20, followed by a win over nationally ranked Park Hill of Missouri 39-22, before being defeated by another nationally ranked opponent in Tuttle, Okla., by a score of 38-25. That gave the Knights a second place finish in their 8-team mini tournament, putting them in a 4-team round-robin competition with the other three second place teams, for day two.
Day two started out with STMA falling to nationally ranked Marmion Academy of Illinois by a score of 37-21, then defeating nationally ranked Washington of Illinois by a score of 37-26, concluding the tourney with a loss to in-state rival Apple Valley, yet another nationally ranked team, by a score of 38-30.
Two knights, Mitch McKee (138 pounds) and Lucas Jeske (170/182) went undefeated with 6-0 (W-L) records, while Patrick McKee (106) went 5-1, and Evan Ronsen (195) posted a 4-0 record.
Evan Foster (285) and Jake Allar (152) were each 4-2 for the tourney, Donnie Leuer (160) was 3-3, while Zach Nygaard (113), Max Jensen (220), and Jake Ross (195/220), each posted a pair of wins.
STMA assistant coach Joe Grygelko said, “We may not have met our expectations for this particular tournament, but we wrestled tough. This tournament is so tough and such a grind, but we’re excited about getting better through hard work and meeting our expectations for upcoming events. We learn a lot when we compete against this kind of competition.”
Junior wrestler Max Jensen added, “Everyone is so good and so strong that you wrestle in this tournament, it teaches you so much. Even when you’re ahead, you can’t be happy with the scoreboard, you have to keep your focus the entire match.”
The competition doesn’t get any easier for the Knights as they will compete in another 32-team tourney with some of the best teams in the nation. They travel to Kaukuana, Wis., Friday and Saturday, Jan. 8 and 9 for the “Cheesehead Invitational” individual tournament.
The STMA junior varsity will compete in a varsity-level individual tournament Saturday, Jan. 9, at Mora.