Port wrestlers face rough postseason tourney

Five Port Washington High School wrestlers ended the regular season with a bang at home on Jan. 20.

Nick Gonzalez at 120 pounds, Kaiden Schumacher at 126, Brady Krueger at 132, Shem Castillo at 195 and Nick Bensen at 220 all won their round robin brackets in a quadrangular meet against Hartford, Homestead and West Bend West.

“Those guys did a really nice job,” coach Angelo LaRosa said.

The format was the same as the week before, with wrestlers split into groupings of similar weights and skills in order to get more matches. With most tournaments canceled this year due to Covid-19, coaches have been trying to find ways to get their teams experience.

Port is preparing for a Division 1 regional in West Bend on Saturday. The top two teams and top two individual finishers advance to a sectional Feb. 6 in Hartford.

State qualifiers were cut in half this season, from 16 to eight, meaning only the top two finishers advance to state from each of the four sectionals, not the usual top three.

LaRosa said he hopes Port will qualify again as a team and get five individuals through, but realistically he’s hoping for just one wrestler to make it to state since the sectionals doubled in size. Port’s has powerhouse Kaukauna and other good teams.

“We don’t really sugarcoat it with our kids. I think we have the toughest sectional in the state,” he said.

Then again, LaRosa, said six months ago he wouldn’t have expected to have a season and a month ago he didn’t expect to have a postseason.

“Anything is better than nothing,” he said.