West Fork without senior, top-ranked wrestler for quadrangular

SHEFFIELD – West Fork coach Jared Arbegast just wanted his kids he had available to wrestle.

With only seven, at best, on his roster for Senior Night, that made it hard to do and resulted in a final dual loss to Garner-Hayfield-Ventura his Warhawks could have easily won.

Both senior heavyweight Levi Janssen and top-ranked 106-pounder Kale Petersen were at home with illness that was not COVID-related and the Cardinals won the final dual of the night 31-30 by sending more bodies out to the mat to receive forfeits.

“Actually, he (Janssen) was planning on being here tonight, had a little injury why he didn’t wrestle at conference,” coach Arbegast said. “Trying to get him healthy, and then today unfortunately, he’s a little under the weather. Stayed home, obviously wanted to be here tonight, Senior Night, and he’s a great kid and he’s come a long ways in his wrestling career. He’s having a really good year, obviously, too.

“It sucks, but we have to err on the side of caution. Same with his brother (Ki) why he’s not wrestling tonight. Kale, same thing…We went with that.”

Coach Arbegast said he even tried to move some weights around against GHV in order to get matches, but the Cardinals’ head coach changed his wrestlers around to earn forfeits instead in order to get the win via criteria F, earning more wins via forfeit.

The Warhawks opened the night with a 51-0 loss against Northwood-Kensett and then dropped a 42-24 dual against North Union.

Despite it all, coach Arbegast saw some good things from his wrestlers.

“We did some good things,” coach Arbegast said. “We’ve got Jaxon McLemore out, he’s green as you can tell; I hope he stays with it, he’s got a lot of potential. He was injured in football and just got cleared like two weeks into January. He’s only been practicing for two weeks, kind of tough.

“Josh Hagin, he just started. He only wants to wrestle JV, obviously you can tell he’s young, too. He’s learning. He asked me if he could try and I said, ‘absolutely.’ I’m never going to turn down a kid.”

In place of Levi Janssen, Jair Ramirez wrestled at heavyweight, going 2-1. Also 2-1 for the Warhawks was Rafe Arbegast at 113/120 and Dakota Lau at 160.

“Jair stepped in for Levi which is kind of fun, he got a nice win there, too,” coach Arbegast. “It was nice of their coach not to send out their 220-pounder, who can also be heavyweight this year, Trevor Kruse; he’s a really good wrestler. It’s a great match-up, he got a win out of it. Nothing wrong with that.

“Rafe…he’s doing pretty good. He’s up and down, all over the board, but he’s trying hard. He’s battling at least and that’s all I can ask. We’ve got to clean some things up, as you know. We’re done (until sectionals). We’re going to be going over some technique and get out there and roll into sectionals and anything can happen there.”

Northwood-Kensett 51

West Fork 0

285– Mason Thofson (N-K) pinned Jair Ramirez 3:09; 106– No match; 113– No match; 120– Treycen Rollene (N-K) dec. Rafe Arbegast 5-0; 126– Michael Jansen (N-K0 won by forfeit; 132– Dalton Logeman (N-K) pinned Autumn Stonecypher 0:51; 138– Hayden Moore (N-K) won by forfeit; 145– Brandon Varner (N-K) pinned Jaxon McLemore 0:45; 152– Tyler Mills (N-K) won by forfeit;160– Drake Tiedemann (N-K) pinned Dakota Lau 5:34; 170– No match; 182– Josiah Kliment (N-K) pinned Carson Nuehring 2:44; 195– No match; 220– No match.

North Union 42

West Fork 24

106– Harley Tobin (NU) won by forfeit; 113– Rafe Arbegast (WF) pinned Liam Kollash 3:38; 120– Gavyn Morphew (NU) won by forfeit; 126– Talan Preister (NU) won by forfeit; 132– Kaden Laabs (NU) pinned Autumn Stonecypher 1:58; 138– No match; 145– Dalton Tobin (NU) pinned Jaxon McLemore 0:48; 152– No match; 160– Kacey Hamsmith (NU) pinned Josh Hagin 0:48; 170– Dakota Lau (WF) pinned Kale Lufkin 4:37; 182– Carson Nuehring (WF) pinned Niccolo Grunig 0:23; 195– No match; 220– Trevor Kruse (NU) won by forfeit; 285– Jair Ramirez (WF) pinned Kolton Walter 4:32.

Garner-Hayfield-Ventura 31

West Fork 30*

113– No match; 120– Rafe Arbegast (WF) pinned Brad Dodd 1:03; 126– James Cash (GHV) won by forfeit; 132– Autumn Stonecypher (WF) won by forfeit; 138– No match; 145– No match;152– Landen Hejlik (GHV) pinned Jaxon McLemore 0:30; 160– Dakota Lau (WF) won by forfeit; 170– Owen Pueggel (GHV) won by forfeit; 182– Carson Nuehring (WF) pinned Colton Steenhard 1:12; 195– Samuel Dodd (GHV) won by forfeit; 220– Kenneth Hook (GHV) won by forfeit; 285– Jair Ramirez (WF) won by forfeit; 106– No match.

* denotes win by Criteria F.