Hoping to build off last year’s success

Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Reporter
 
The combined Newcastle/Upton wrestling team is poised to get off to a busy start this season, and head coach Lee McCoy noted there will be some challenges facing the squad, which is largely comprised of athletes who are relatively young or inexperienced. 
The Dogies graduated Trayton Dawson, Wyatt Corley, Teigen Marchant and Alan Baker (Upton) from last year’s squad. The first three were state runners-up, while Baker finished fourth at the tournament.
The team is returning sophomore Kale Corley, who was the state champion at 120 as only a freshmen. McCoy confirmed that with that win Corley, who will begin the season at 138 and then drop to 132, has set a goal to become a four-year state champ, but he also cautioned that it will be no easy task to achieve.
“Classes from 120-160 are historically very competitive, so it will be a tough go for him,” Lee began. “Kale knows he’s got a target on his back, and we’ve been talking about the fact that just because you win one, doesn’t mean they’re going to give you the other three. He has to take it one at a time and work extra hard because now people know who he is, and they want to beat him. He could fly under the radar last year as a freshman, but that’s not the case now.”
Also returning for the Dogies is senior Reid Holmes, who missed the state tournament last year due to illness. As a sophomore, he was a state finalist, however, and Lee expects him to make a run at returning in his final season if he can remain healthy.
Jory McFarland and Skylar Jenkins also earned their way to the state tourney last year and come back this season as a junior and sophomore respectively, vying for another go at the title. Senior Gavin Durfee of Upton is the only other wrestler returning from last season.
“We aren’t returning very many, and we have a lot of freshmen and first-year kids who have moved in,” Lee began. “We’re young but the kids are coachable and have great attitudes. They are going to take their knocks as a team this year for sure though, because they are pretty young.”
New to the team this year are Nate King and Dylan Drost, and the rest are freshmen. Between the returning and new guys, the team has 17 total, which is up one from last year. 
Though only increasing by a minimal number, an advantage this crew has this season is that they are able to fill more weight classes than before. While the Dogies gave up four or five open weight classes at duals in 2017-18, this year McCoy anticipates they will only have to forfeit two or three each time.
“For duals, I anticipate being able to bump people around so we will only have to give up a couple of weight classes, which is much better than last year,” he predicted. “This year we’re spread out pretty well, and should be able to move some people around better.”
McCoy is pleased with how his squad has jumped right into the season, despite their youth and inexperience.
“This is a great group of kids who all have great attitudes,” he nodded. “We had our lock-in following our weight assessment last Friday into Saturday, and the kids did a phenomenal job through that — which is basically 12 hours of workouts — so that’s awesome.”
The lock-in consists of three separate wrestling practices, as well as a weight-lifting, a conditioning and a swimming workout. Between each workout, the athletes had time to rest and recover.
The Dogies will begin their season this Thursday in Custer where they will dual the Wildcats, Newell and Bennett County, and then on Friday the team will split. Some will head to Lusk for a one-day invitational, while six others will roll to Rapid City for a two-day invitational. Competing in Rapid are Corley, Holmes, Blake Durfee, Gavin Durfee, McFarland and Jenkins.