by Oran Sorenson, assistant coach
Our local gym got to host its first wrestling event of the season on December 15th when the Flyers from Chester came to town for a good old fashion two team dual. But the public was largely left out of the fun because of COVID-19 restrictions set in place by the South Dakota High School Activities Association. For tournaments, each wrestler is allowed to have two parents or other designated persons in attendance, and for duals each is allowed four because of the smaller number of schools involved.
Nonetheless, Garretson had quite a vocal and decent crowd on hand to cheer our grapplers on to victory. The Blue Dragons would cap the night with a 45-18 advantage for the home crowd. Karsten Rozeboom won a tight 8-7 decision at 152 lbs., all others were able to dominate with first period pins. Chester earned their 18 points with a pin at 106 and two forfeits. Our team still has too many open spots on our roster as we give away up to 6 forfeits or 36 points.
It should be noted that Chester, despite the lopsided loss, has just restarted their program. Years ago, Chester was a tough team in the area, and had started wrestling even before Garretson started in 1969-70. Over the years with declining enrollments and the like, Chester would drop their program. Some years later it was restarted with some success, until they joined Dell Rapids St. Mary’s and Baltic wrestling with the Quarriers of Dell Rapids in the A division. Chester is currently in only their second year of being out again on their own and should be proud to have their own team back on the mat.
Christmas would come early for three of our grapplers the following Saturday at the Mount Vernon-Plankinton Titan invitational. Our team came in 7th of 9 teams with a tough team from Redfield taking home the championship trophy. Not one of our boys would have an easy road in what was to be our toughest competition yet of the season. Jayse Miller finished 3rd in a very tough 126 class, and both Trevon Cross and Tayson Swatek finished 4th at 138 and 145 respectively.
Our final outing before the Christmas break was a battle at Montrose of the traditionally strong teams in the Central Valley Conference. Teamwise the night could not go good for the Blue Dragons with six open weight classes. Nonetheless all the wrestlers won some matches and Jayse Miller went 3-0 for the night, beating all of his opponents from McCook Central, Howard, and Parker. At the 220 lb. class Jayden Richter was able to defeat an opponent from McCook Central he had lost to earlier in his career. It was host McCook Central Montrose who had the good night defeating each of their conference foes and going undefeated for the night.
Next action for our team will be this Thursday at Freeman. We will wrestle host Marion-Freeman, Flandreau, and number one ranked Canton. This coming Saturday we will be hosting the Jesse James Invitational here in our own gym. A few years ago, we combined our tourney with the Dan Pansch Invitational in Brandon. Because the SDHSAA in Pierre recommends smaller events during this pandemic period, at least for this year Garretson was asked to take eight other schools with them and hold separate events to make things safer. Participating with us in Garretson will be Beresford/Alcester-Hudson, Bon Homme, Chamberlain, Elk Point-Jefferson, Flandreau, Parkston, Tri Valley, and Viborg-Hurley.
