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The
Official Newspaper of Manchester and Delaware County, Iowa
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
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Hawks make it 11 in a row, claim District Championship
by Alison Nesteby
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It’s good to be a Hawk fan.
Things couldn’t be going better for the West Delaware boys basketball team. Victories over Independence and Waukon last week have claimed another District Title for the boys, and moved them within one game of the 2008 State Tournament in Des Moines.
Independence traveled to town on Tuesday, Feb. 19,hoping to redeem themselves from their last matchup against the Hawks, which resulted in a 69-49 WD victory.
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Left: Ben Lechtenberg blocks a shot from an Indee player on Tuesday in Manchester. Middle: Junior Seth Engelken holds up a number one as the Hawks defeat Indee last Tuesday. Right: Senior BJ Hermsen rejects a shot from a Waukon player on Thursday at Upper Iowa. The Hawks will battle Crestwood for a State berth tonight. Press photos by Alison Nesteby |
While the Mustangs would keep the Hawks working hard
throughout the entire game, the outcome ended with another Mustang disappointment. The Hawks ended the season for the Mustangs, handing them a 50-45 loss.
The Mustangs jumped out to an early lead over the Hawks, slating the score at 2-5 with 5:18 left in the first. The Hawks quickly cut that margin and took the lead, leaving the Mustangs trailing by one point at the conclusion of the first, 14-13.
The Mustangs chipped away at the Hawks’ lead and jumped out 15-18. Senior BJ Hermsen nailed a three-pointer with 6:17 left to tie the score 18-18. The Mustangs wouldn’t see another lead for the remainder of the night.
Ben Lechtenberg made six of his 12 total points in the second quarter, giving the Hawks a 26-21 halftime lead.
Following a pair of Lechtenberg, Seth Engelken baskets, Hermsen sank three to help the Hawks keep their slight lead over the Mustangs, 36-32 at the end of the third.
The Hawks slowly increased their lead in the fourth, starting with a Hermsen basket. Indee felt the burn and called a timeout with 5:36 left to discuss the 38-32 margin they needed to overcome.
The Mustangs came off their timeout and cut the Hawks lead to three, 38-35. WD took a timeout with 4:26 left and came out firing. Lechtenberg and Engelken each added a basket before once again, another Indee timeout. The Hawks led 42-35 at the timeout with 2:24 remaining in the game.
Engelken added four points in the last 36 seconds of the game, sinking a field goal and two free throws. Hermsen added one more free throw with nine second remaining to round out the scoring for both teams, setting the final score at 50-45. A much different margin than the Hawks/Mustangs last meeting, but a win nonetheless.
Hermsen was high scorer for the Hawks, sinking 20 points and grabbing six rebounds. Engelken added 13 points and six rebounds, while Lechtenberg scored 12 and snagged a team high eight rebounds.
On Thursday, Feb. 21, the Hawks traveled to Fayette to battle for a District Championship against Waukon at Upper Iowa University. At least they expected a battle.
Waukon beat Oelwein in their District opener, but something went terribly wrong in their game against West Delaware; that, and everything seemed to go right for the Hawks.
The first half belonged to the Hawks, who couldn’t seem to do anything wrong. Junior Seth Engelken scored 12 points in the first half alone, hitting two three-pointers.
Not only was the offensive half of the game going nearly perfect for West Delaware, but the defense fell nicely into place as well.
Going to halftime, the Hawks held a 33-10 lead over the Waukon Indians. They only allowed three Indian points in the whole second quarter.
Not much changed in the second half for either team. West Delaware continued to score big, and the Indians kept struggling to overcome the dominating Hawks.
The Indians did outscore the Hawks in the third quarter, putting up 11, as opposed to the Hawks’ eight. But those three points were going to do much for the Indians’ 20-point deficit entering the fourth quarter.
Putting a little salt in the wound, the Hawks once again outscored the Indians in the fourth quarter, 17-14. Hermsen put up seven of his 20 total points in the final quarter alone.
The hot Hawks ended yet another opponent’s season, defeating the Indians by score of 58-35, and clinching the District Championship.
Hermsen was again high scorer for the Hawks, recording 20 points and nine rebounds. Engelken added 15. Ben Lechtenberg scored 14 points and recorded seven rebounds.
The Hawks will compete on Tuesday against Crestwood at the McLeod Center on the University of Northern Iowa Campus at 6:30 p.m. Crestwood enters the game with an 18-3 record to face the 17-5 Hawks. The winner of the game will earn a trip to the 2008 State Tournament.
WD vs. Indepe
FG: WD 19-47 40%; Indee 17-44 39%
FT: WD 9-16 56%; Indee 4-5 80%
Assists: WD 19 (Kafer 5, Crawford 4, Engelken 4, Hermsen 4, Mangold 1, Lechtenberg 1)
Rebounds: WD 26 (Lechtenberg 8, Engelken 6, Hermsen 6, Kafer 2, Crawford 2, Mangold 1, Klein 1)
Individual scoring: Hermsen 20, Engelken 13, Lechtenberg 12, Crawford 5
WD vs. Waukon
FG: WD 22-42 52%; Waukon 13-49 27%
FT: WD 10-20 50%; Waukon 78%
Assists: WD 20 (Crawford 6, Engelken 5, Kafer 4, Hermsen 2, Mangold, Klein 1, Lechtenberg 1)
Rebounds: WD 31 (Hermsen 9, Lechtenberg 7, Crawford 4, Kafer 2, Klein 2, Walters 2, Mensen 1, Mangold 1, Engelken 1, Heinrichs 1, Gaffney 1)
Individual scoring: Hermsen 20, Engelken 15, Lechtenberg 14, Crawford 4, Kafer 2,Heinrichs 2, Walters 1 |
Hawks advance to State Duals, lose in first round
by Ken Boesenberg |
The West Delaware Hawk wrestling team had waited a long time for the chance to qualify for the Class 2A State Wrestling Dual Tournament. They had had their qualifying competition delayed from before the traditional state tournament to after and then another delay on top of that.
The Hawks came out with a vengeance as they destroyed West Liberty 67-9 and then put almost an equal thumping on Williamsburg, 47-20.
The Hawks looked a lot like a run away freight train on Thursday night in Anamosa with the two huge wins.
They started the night off against West Liberty. At 130-pounds the Hawks Matt Wenger lost by fall and Pat Soppe at 135 lost a tough 10-6 decision. Those two wins gave West Liberty the lead, 9-0.
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West Delaware 152-pound senior wrestler, Adam Rave has his patented cradle hooked up on his opponent from Davenport Assumption during first round action at the State Team Dual Wrestling Tournament in Cedar Rapids. Adam won his match but the Hawks fell to the Knights 42-30 to end their season. Photo by Ken Boesenberg. |
They did not score again as the Hawks rattled off 12 consecutive wins to roll to the 58-point victory.
Sophomore, Chris Ketchum (140) got the Hawks on the board with a pin in 2:30 after being up 4-0 entering the second period.
Senior brother, Nick Ketchum followed suit with a second period fall as well. Nick held a 2-0 lead early in the match before giving up a reversal with just under a minute to go in the first period to enter the second period tied at 2-2.
At 152-pounds, senior Adam Rave scored an early takedown and recorded three near fall points to grab and early 5-0 lead. With the cradle locked up Adam recorded the fall right at the end of the first quarter to give the Hawks an 18-9 lead.
Junior Devon Alber kept the pin-a-thon going with a fall over his opponent at the 3:28 mark. Devon had built a 5-0 lead with a takedown an escape and another takedown before recording the fall. That made the score 24-9.
At 171-pounds Tyler Manternach used four takedowns a reversal and three near fall points to pick up a 13-4 major decision to up the Hawk lead to 28-9.
Junior Carl Broghammer was looking for a rematch with West Liberty’s Tomas Lira at 189-pounds but Lira did not make the trip because of an illness. Carl made quick work of the young lad the West Liberty sent out in place of Lira, recording an early first period fall.
Broghammers fall made the score 34-9.
At 215-pounds the Hawks Adam Mossner built an early 6-1 lead before pinning his opponent before the first period came to a close. Adam’s pin ballooned the Hawk lead to 40-9.
The Hawks were no where near done with West Liberty’s light counting lesson.
Nick Trenkamp (285) picked up a hard fought 3-2 win for the Hawks with a nice takedown late in the second period.
Up 43-9 it was time for the little guys to hit the mat, and hit the mat they did.
PC McEnany (103), took just 31-seconds to dispose of his opponent; Jared Hoefer (112) bested that time by a full second as he recorded his win by fall in just 30-seconds.
Nathan Vaske (119) stretched his match out a little longer picking up a couple of
takedowns before recording the fall just 35-seconds into the match.
With the score 61-9 and just one match remaining the Hawks Brett Yonkovic came out like a man on a mission and stacked up his opponent to record the fastest fall of the night - 19-seconds.
Final score West Delaware 67, West Liberty 9.
In rattling off the 12 straight wins to close out the dual the Hawks had 10 pins, one major decision and one regular decision.
Next up was a date with the Raiders of Williamsburg who had four very tough state qualifiers and a good dual meet team.
It was the general consensus that the second dual would be a much different affair than the first one.
It was, kind of.
Pat Soppe opened the dual with a tough hard fought match which he lost 9-4 for a 3-0 Raider lead.
Chris Ketchum built and early 5-0 lead at 140-pounds and kept adding to it until he came away with an impressive 11-2 major decision. That gave the Hawks the lead, 4-3.
At 145-pounds, Nick Ketchum dominated his opponent from the start of the second period on. He was tied 2-2 at the end of the first but recorded an escape and a takedown to go up 5-2 midway through the second period. Nick picked up a point on a stall call and a late take down to win by a score of 8-3.
Up 7-3 Adam Rave gave the Hawks a bit of a cushion in his 152-pound match as he recorded a win by fall at 1:14 to up the lead to 13-3.
At 160-pounds the Hawks Devon Alber battled a Raider state qualifier in a hard fought match. Devon lost 11-5 but stayed very aggressive throughout the entire six minutes.
With the Hawk lead now sitting at seven points, 13-6 Tyler Manternach hit the mat and picked up a nice 4-1 decision over another Raider state qualifier. The win put the Hawks ahead 16-6.
Carl Broghammer came out in his 189-pound match like a man possessed. After a very fast takedown and three near fall points to grab an early 5-0 lead Carl ended the match with a fall just before the end of the first period. That pushed the Hawk lead to 22-6.
At 215-pounds and 285-pounds the Raiders had the Blythe brothers coming to the mat.
Holden at 215-pounds was the Class 2A state champion and his brother, Austin was the runner-up at 285.
In the 215-pound match the Hawks Adam Mossner did a fine job even though he lost by technical fall, 15-0. Much to the dismay of the Williamsburg crowd he could not pin Mossner.
At 285 the action was even more intense as the Hawks Nick Trenkamp lost by a single point, 3-2. Those eight Raider points made the score 22-14.
At 103, PC McEnany took some of the Williamsburg crowd out of the meet with a huge first period pin. The additional six points doubled up the Hawk score on the Raiders, 28-14.
At 112 Jared Hoefer got off to a great start and led 7-0 in the second period before getting caught and pinned to make the score 28-20.
With an eight point lead and just three matches remaining the Hawks needed a big win out of their 119-pounder, Nathan Vaske. And a big win the got as Nathan made short work out of his opponent, recording a first period fall.
That fall made the score 34-20 and punched the Hawks ticket to the State Dual Meet in Cedar Rapids on Saturday.
Just for good measure the Hawks got pins in their last two matches of the night. The first one by Brett Yonkovic at 125-pounds and the last on by Andrew Pesek at 130-pounds to make the final score 46-20 in favor of the Hawks.
The Hawk crowd went into a frenzy while silence fell over the opposite side of the gym occupied by Raider fans.
The Hawks opened up the State Dual Meet competition against a very good Davenport Assumption Knight squad at noon on Saturday.
The end comes for everything, sometimes it comes a bit sooner than one would like or anticipate.
Such was the case with the West Delaware Hawk wrestling team’s trip to the 2008 State Dual Team Wrestling Tournament last Saturday.
The Hawks entered the tournament as the number three seed behind the obvious number one, Ballard and number two Creston Orient-Macksburg.
Seeded sixth were the Knights of Davenport Assumption, the Hawks opponents in the first round of the tournament.
In the end it was too much Knight power for the Hawks to handle as they fell to Assumption, 42-30.
The defeat marked the end of the high school wrestling careers for four senior Hawk wrestlers. Nick Ketchum (145), Adam Rave (152), Tyler Manternach (171) and Adam Mossner (215).
Those four have provided outstanding leadership to a team that was dominated by underclassmen this season. Each year the coaching staff asks the seniors to step up and step up they did for the Hawks.
The four combined to win 115 matches while losing just 38 for a winning percentage of 75 percent while leading the Hawks to an overall 14-3 dual meet record. Among those 14 wins were Titles from the Starmont Invite, the Jerry Eckenrod Invitational at Benton Community, a Sectional title at Dyersville Beckman and a District title at Anamosa.
As for the dual with Assumption the Hawks got down early, 11-0 as they lost at 135 and 140.
Three of the next four wrestlers to hit the mat for the Hawks were seniors and they showed once again why they had been such good leaders during the year.
Nick Ketchum (145) picked up a first period fall and Adam Rave (152) stuck his Assumption opponent in 28-seconds to give the Hawks a 12-11 lead.
Junior Devon Alber (160) came out very aggressively and also recorded a first period fall to up the Hawk lead to 18-11. When senior Tyler Manternach (171) left the mat he was in possession of a 6-1 victory that upped the West Delaware lead to 21-11.
Assumption picked up a win by fall at 189 when Jamie Helmrichs took the mat for the Hawks. That moved bumped Carl Broghammer up to 215 where he posted an 8-4 win over the Knights state qualifier, Drew Sheeder.
The Hawks led 24-17 going into the heavyweight match between Class 2A 3rd place finisher, Andrew Bush of Assumption and the Hawks Nick Trenkamp.
Bush played a stalling game for nearly the entire match before making one move in the last 30 seconds to pick up a come from behind fall over Trenkamp. The win by Bush pulled the Knights back to within a single point of the Hawks, 24-23.
Assumption picked up wins by fall at both 103 and 112 to grab a 35-24 lead with three matches left.
At 119-pounds the Hawks Nathan Vaske closed out his season with a pin to cut the Assumption lead to just five points, 35-30.
The Knights got wins at both 125 and 130 to win the dual by a final score of 42-30.
The Hawks ended the season with a 14-4 record, not exactly where they wanted to be but better than what many would have expected from such a young team.
Next season the team leadership will be taken over by this years juniors in the line up, Nathan Vaske, Devon Alber, Carl Broghammer and Nick Trenkamp. Those four combined this season for a record of 104-29 for a winning percentage of 78 percent. |
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