Sports from the week of March 8, 2006

State is tough for wrestlers

Season had many sucesses

All three of the Panther wrestlers were defeated in the first round of wrestling at the state wrestling tournament in St. Paul last week.

Both Luke Prairie, at 119-pounds, and Cole Cooreman, at 125 pounds, had the bad luck of having the wrestler who defeated them losing in the next round so they were not eligible for the wrestle backs.

Paul Carlson was able to wrestle again and he won a match before losing another and being eliminated.

Luke Prairie met Coulter Uscola of Park Rapids in the first round and lost a 12-10 decision to him.

“Luke fell behind 10-0 in the early going but he was able to recover and did a great job of coming back to make it a close match,” said Panther Coach Brian Michelson.

Cole Cooreman was matched against Kaleb Schmitz of Caledonia and lost a 4-2 decision.

“It was a tight match the whole way,” said Michelson. “The guy was tough and Cole just couldn’t turn him.”

Paul Carlson lost his first match 10-8 to Joe Sloughter of Orono.

“The kid was weird to wrestle-very unorthodox,” said Michelson. “Paul just couldn’t get a takedown.”

In his next match, Carlson got a 2-0 win over Jacob Vaith of Lake City.

“There were no take downs in the first period,” said Michelson. “Paul got a reversal in the second period to get the win.”

Carlson suffered his second defeat in a tough match against Blain Johnson of Litchfield. He lost 2-1 in two overtimes.

“The kid was very good on his feet and the match ended regulation time tied at 1-1,” said Michelson. “In the first overtime there was no take down and Paul (Carlson) chose to take the down position in the second overtime period. The kid was very strong and Paul just could not get away so the ruling was that he lost.”

Cooreman ended the season with a 36-5 record, Prairie finished 18-12, and Carlson closed out with a 38-5 record.

• • •

“All in all it was a very good season, one of the best we have had in a long time,” said Michelson. Major team accomplishments cited by the coach were:

• Earning a split with a strong Windom team that made the Section 3AA Final Four.

• Losing to Wabasso by only a point. Wabasso finished fourth in state Class A.

• The Panthers were competitive against Canby, the Class A champions.

• TMB wrestlers battled Adrian in close matches twice. Adrian was the third Class AA team in state.

TMB boys finish 11-15

The Panther boys’ basketball team was eliminated from post-season play by Windom at Windom Saturday night 77-54.

Tracy/Milroy/Balaton finished the season with an 11-15 record.

The Panthers got off to a good start against Windom and took an early 9-7 lead. However the Eagles then got a hot shooting spell and went on a 40-10 run to pull to a 48-19 lead at intermission.

For the game the Eagles hit 28 of 53 field goal attempts for 53% and were 4 of 10 on threes for 40% and they shot much better than that in the last part of the first half. TMB hit 17 of 49 field goal attempts for 35% and were 3 of 16 on threes for 19%. In the second half the Panthers out-scored the Eagles 35-29 but were not able to overcome the big lead held by Windom at the intermission. The Eagles played good defense and took excellent care of the ball in addition to shooting very well.

“We gave it everything we had,” said Panther Coach Nat Boyer. “When the shots don’t fall for us and they do for the other team, you just have to continue to play hard and that is what the boys did. You can’t fault the effort they gave. This group of young men has worked hard ever since the end of the 2004-5 season and it came to a culminating point at Windom.

“It would have been great to extend our season further and on another night that might have happened. Take nothing away from Windom, they played a very good game. It is never fun to end the season, the bond that is created between the players, managers and coaching staff is one of the toughest parts of the season coming to an end.”

The Panthers pulled down 28 rebounds to 22 for the Eagles, and had 14 assists to 22 for Windom. TMB had 7 steals to 9 for Windom The Panthers also had 9 blocks to 2 for Windom. But TMB turned the ball over 18 times to only 5 by Windom.

T/M/B- McIntire, 1, 1-2, 3; Knott, 3, 4-4, 10; Nelson, 1, 0-0, 2;Rignell, 2, 1-4, 5; Prairie, 1, 1-1, 3; I. Dolan, 1, 2-2, 4; Zwaschka, 3, 0-0, 6; Radke, 2, 0-0, 5; A.Dolan, 2, 0-0, 6; Paradis, 0,0-2,0; Kaup, 1, 1-1, 3; Schmidt, 2, 1-2, 5; Xiong, 1, 0-0, 2.