Greenfield Wrestlers Take 4th at Nathan Hale Bauer Brawl Tournament

Over the past weekend, Greenfield traveled to Nathan Hale High School to participate in the 2^nd annual Bauer Brawl. Greenfield, with all of their wrestlers back after injury and illness, were able to put together a 4^th place finish out of 13 teams.

Leading the charge for the Hustlin’ Hawks was Tom Friedbacher (10-4) and Anthony Rychlowski (5-2) who posted the highest finishes of 3^rd place. Friedbacher pinned a Waukesha West opponent with a pin (2:33) and then faced Lightning Hernandez from Racine Horlick who is currently ranked 7^th in Wisconsin. Friedbacher wrestled a strong match but was caught in a ¾ nelson late and was pinned (5:49). Friedbacher shook off the loss and came back to defeat Maurice Beck from Nathan Hale (3-2) to take home 3^rdplace. Coach Otto praised Friedbacher for his consistent wrestling and leadership. “Tommy has been wrestling some top notch wrestlers and he always keeps a good perspective on his matches. His best wrestling is yet to come”.

Anthony Rychlowski, only wrestling in his second match of the season, posted 3 wins and 1 loss en route to a 3^rd place finish. Rychlowski pinned an opponent from Milwaukee King (1:50) to set up a match against Ryan Vankervoorde from Nathan Hale. The match was close throughout and a couple of penalty points for locked hands proved too much for Rychlowski to overcome. Vankervoorde won the match 6-5. Rychlowski then went on to pin Lorry Venturi from Wauwatosa East/West in 1:28 to take home the 3^rd place medal. Coach Otto noted “Rycho has been working hard every week and seems focused on improving. He will be pushing people the rest of the season. It’s nice to see his hard work pay off.”

Finishing fourth for the Hustlin’ Hawks was Tyler Dorfner and Turner Panich. Both wrestlers were in tough weight classes and endured some tough defeats before taking 4^th place finishes. Both wrestlers were coming of injuries and made some mistakes that cost them some matches. Coach Otto noted “Both of these guys have endured illness and injury and I am confident they will get back to where they were before they got hurt. They are talented wrestlers and we need them to get back to the basics and improve their conditioning”.  

Finishing 5^th place for Greenfield was Tony Kurczewski, Chad Karges, and Matt Braatz. Finishing in 6^th place was Dylan Kumbera and Victor Castro. Otto made a point of saying “I was proud of all the wrestlers for wrestling the matches through to the end and realizing how every team point counts no matter what place you wrestle for. These guys are going to be the difference in matches this year”.

The Hustlin’ Hawks travel to Cudahy (Jan. 9^th) for a double dual against Cudahy-St. Francis and Pius Wednesday night. Then travel to South Milwaukee Saturday (Jan. 12^th) to wrestle in the South Milwaukee Duals.