season, and he also did some work in the offseason, which is good. It’s only going to help him.” Other familiar faces are expected to return to the lineup as well. John Artz (25-25 in 2022-23), Dennis May (23-27), Pedro Lin- hares (6-33), Braeden Nees (14- 28), Holt Bellon (12-31), and Holden Boshart (17-30) are no longer inexperienced grapplers and that should show on the mat. Auderer will look to those wres- tlers to show the youngsters the way. The Tigers’ longtime coach admits his team of approximately 30 student-athletes is split pretty evenly between those who have experience and those who don’t. “It’s a tale of two teams this year with guys that are experienced and guys that are brand new to the sport,” Auderer said. “Growth in leadership and growth in knowl- edge of how the sport works, that will be key. That means diet, mindset, and what it takes to be successful. Then, of course, you want to see a progression in tech- nique and things like that. Those are the things you have to do and see in order to improve.” So, yes, there are some un- knowns with the Tigers and that’s OK. Could there be some fresh faces step into the lineup and make an immediate impact? Au- derer thinks so. A guy like Cael O’Brien, who missed the majority of last season due to injury, is now healthy and has a chance to leave an impression. Mason Wibholm has a chance too, and Taylor Dukes has his eyes on the 113- pound weight class as a freshman as he attempts the grueling wres-
aren’t many secrets when it comes to the conference hierarchy, and some things never change. Bondurant-Farrar will be good. Really good. Shocking, I know.
Carlisle will be good too.
Winterset and Ballard — the same. Carroll will have some quality grapplers. North Polk falls into that category as well. “We’re in a gut-wrenching con- ference,” Auderer said. “The good of that is you know where you stand with the top kids, so there’s the measuring stick of what trajec- tory you’re on. You’ve got to show up every night.” Nine of the 2023 individual con- ference champions return, five of them wearing Bondurant-Farrar singlets — Reid Foster (106), Con- nor Fiser (113), Matthew McCrea (120), Nolan Fellers (138), and Jack Lewis (152). However, Car- lisle is the defending team cham- pion, as its depth a season ago led to a 28.5-point win over the Blue- jays. The other returning conference champions include Cael Nelson (126) of Carroll, Jaxon Miller (145) and Asa Hemsted (170) of Carlisle, and Brody Sampson (182) of Ballard. Foster (fifth), Fiser (third), Fellers (third), Miller (fourth), and Lewis (seventh) were all 3A state medalists a winter ago. Sampson and Ballard teammate Henry Christensen (220) were both 2A state runners-up.
tling and basketball double over the next few months. This winter will also see shifting weight classes in Iowa, as the divi- sions were altered slightly from previous seasons. The 14 weight classes will now be: 106, 113, 120, 126, 132, 138, 144, 150, 157, 165, 175, 190, 215, and 285. What has changed the most? Es- sentially, the decision was to add another middle weight (157),
which eliminated a class near the top of the lineup (182). “I would say it helps us more than it hurts us because we don’t have a lot of big guys,” Auderer said of the weight class shift. “But for a guy like Mason Griffin, I wish that weight class was 225 instead of 215 because he wants to get bigger for football, not cut weight.” While there may be some un- knowns with weight classes, there
26 GAME ON | WINTER 2023-24
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