Faster starts lead to more wins for Ozaukee

It took most of the season to learn it, but Ozaukee High School wrestlers became the aggressors and have positive results to show for it.

The Warriors took second at Saturday’s Oakfield Invite with 189 points.

Oostburg won the 12-team meet with 308.5 points. Green Bay West/East/Southeast had 182.5 and Xavier had 133.

Efrain Altamirano (12-7) took second at 126 pounds and Blake Cocanower (17-17) was second at 182.

Joe Grabowski (11-19) at 145 pounds, Talan Dybul (11-15) at 152, Jonny Melendez (10-19) at 170 and Grady Klas (7-13) at 195 each took third.

“We came out and we were aggressive,” assistant coach Brandon Clapper said. “For the first time all year it looked like we weren’t afraid to make mistakes, and when we made mistakes we did a pretty good job of doing what we needed to do to counter those mistakes.”

Clapper led the Warriors as head coach Cole Large accompanied Mya Delleree to the girls’ state meet in La Crosse.

Altamirano won a 3-1 decision over Robert Wildenauer (17-20) of Fort Atkinson, won a 16-10 decision over Dante Santana (16-17) of Fond du Lac, won a 13-8 decision over Oostburg’s Alec Malwitz (14-14) and a 7-6 decision in the semifinal over Jack Lisowe (18-16) of New Holstein.

Altamirano made a couple of mistakes in his early matches but “just did what he had to do to get back into it,” Clapper said.

In the finals, Braxton Kohn (14-4) beat Altamirano, 16-11.

“We were close in pretty much the whole thing,” Clapper said of the match.

Cocanower pinned Xavier’s Lucas Bertello (14-12) in 1 minute, 38 seconds, lost a 10-6 decision to Jay DeBlaey (25-5) of Oostburg and beat Fort Atkinson’s Aidan Leurquin (23-15) in a 9-4 decision.

In the final, DeBlaey pinned Cocanower in 2:43.

Melendez went 4-1, pinning three opponents before being pinned. In the third-place match, he pinned Fond du Lac’s Zander Scannell (2-3) in 4:57.

Dybul went 3-2, pinning two foes and getting pinned twice. For third, he won an 11-2 major decision over Jeremiah Lepien (6-13) of Living Word Lutheran.

Grabowski went 2-3 with all matches won by pins. To take third, he pinned Quinton Lumsden (8-18) of Xavier in 2:57.

Klas was pinned in the only two matches he wrestled in a small weight class.

Michael Higginbotham (14-18) at 132 pounds, Evan Alexander (4-13) at 138 and freshman Jovan Lopez (8-16) at 285 pounds finished fourth.

Lopez won three decisions before being pinned and losing an 11-8 decision to Josh Wensink (12-15) of Oostburg for third.

Clapper said he was impressed with the freshman.

“It’s hard to get takedowns as a big guy, particularly as a freshman. In one match, he had four, most of them single legs. For a big guy, that’s a big thing,” he said.

The effort, Clapper and Large said, was better than on Thursday when the Warriors lost to Cedar Grove-Belgium, 60-9, and beat Elkart Lake-Glenbeulah/Howards Grove, 58-4.

The team, Large said, talked about being  afraid to make mistakes after those matches and learned instead to be aggressive.

“A lot of this year we looked more defensive and this weekend they looked like they wanted to go on offense a lot more. It’s been a mentality switch,” Clapper said.

Ozaukee competes in the Big East Conference tournament at Reedsville on Saturday.