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HARTINGTON — The Hartington- Newcastle School Board approved a request Monday from Cedar Catholic to dissolve their wrestling co-op.
Hartington-Newcastle's vote came after the Cedar Catholic School Board held a lengthy meeting last week before ultimately deciding to seek a dissolution of the two-year co-op agreement.
Even though Hartington will now field two high school wrestling teams, the two squads will continue to share the same wrestling facility, the same coaches and the same transportation to most meets.
NSAA rules prohibit the two schools from actually practicing together, though, so separate practice sessions must be held.
At Monday's meeting, wrestling coach Justin Bartling said the wrestlers from both schools work very hard each week in practice. They just want to compete, but not all wrestlers would be able to compete in Class B, not just because of stiffer competition, but because some specific rules will keep them off the mats.
In Class C, all team members, regardless if they are varsity or junior varsity, are able to compete in tournaments. In Class B tournaments, JV wrestlers are not allowed to compete, Bartling said.
'When we talk about Class B where JV can't wrestle, that's not fair to them,' he said. 'My own son, I know he'll be JV because he's the same size as the (Hochstein) twins, I'd have to look him in the eye, and say, 'well, keep practicing, but you can't compete at the tournament.' It's not fair to them.'
That was just one example of local wrestlers that would not be given the chance to compete in Class B, Bartling said.
'There's kids like Grady Lammers, that kid just wants to compete. He wants to go to (Class) D because he knows he'll medal in D. Ty (Opfer) wrestled JV the last two years. He is guaranteed the opportunity to be varsity with this. We have one of the best 150 pounders in the state here that didn't even get to wrestle in Districts. That changes with this.'
Seeding for post season tournaments would also affect the team if it moved to Class B, Bartling said.
“When we go to districts, our kids' records will basically be thrown out. I could have an undefeated returning state champion and still be like the seventh seed and have to face a returning state medalist in the first round because our records won’t matter.”
He said the criteria for post-season seeding is based first on head-to-head competition, “but if we never see any of those kids, that hurts us.'
After that, they go off of how you did against common opponents. 'If we don’t wrestle any of those Class B kids, that hurts us. Our season records don’t count until after all that,” he said.
Board President Jason Dendinger, the only board member to vote against the proposal, said he is disappointed the co-op is breaking up.
“Personally, I don’t like the way this seems to tear apart yet another successful community program,” he said. “In the last several years we’ve seen our community youth basketball program get torn apart. We don’t have it anymore. Football, junior golf — they’ve all just gone by the wayside.”
School Board member Jason Heikes, who is a member of the school’s athletics and activities committee, said the committee talked about all the options.
“As a committee, we felt it was our best option,” he said. “Not that we enjoyed these options, we didn’t want to be here, but this was our best option at this point.”
Bartling said the coaches want to see all athletes from both schools succeed.
“We are doing our best to make sure the team camaraderie stays — we are doing our best to keep that. That’s why we’re going to all the same meets together and doing everything we can together,” he said.
In an interview prior to the meeting, Cedar Catholic High School President Dan Hoesing said this is a decision his school did not take lightly.
Hoesing said Coach Bartling came to him in April with concerns that enrollment numbers for wrestling programs across the state would push the co-op into Class B.
Hoesing and Principal/Activities Director Chad Cattau then started their research into all the numbers and developed a list of pros and cons for staying in Class C or moving up to Class B.
“We wanted to have as much information as we could — all the pros and cons,” Hoesing said.
“If we didn’t think about all the possible negatives of doing this, then we stood a chance of hurting somebody,” said Hoesing.
That research resulted in a 16-page report he shared with school board members last week.
The report listed all the enrollment numbers for wrestling schools, the cost of having to travel greater distances to compete against Class B schools, coaches comments and parents’ comments.
“After looking it all over, we realized if we stay in Class B, there is a lot more downside then upside,” he said. “Moving up to Class B and thinking we are going to compete — that’s just not realistic.”
Another negative to moving up a class is that it would greatly hinder the parents’ ability to attend matches.
“We can fill a gym with a home meet, but there is no Class B school that’s going to want to wrestle up here,” he said.
Getting into Class B tournaments is also a big challenge, he said.
“We tried Plattesmouth, Bennington, Blair and York. They were all full and would not let us in,” he said.
The extra travel involved can also cause issues, he said.
“That travel, that’s a lot more stress on the athletes. You’ve got to drive four hours to weigh in at 7:30 in the morning. Then you wrestle until about six at night, then you take a four-hour ride home. That’s not exactly fair to them either.”
