Last Updated: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 7:56 AM CST
Winter sports back in session
Boys’ swimming, basketball and wrestling practice began Monday
By Kevin Damask
DAILY NEWS SPORTS REPORTER
Last Monday, the winter sports season at Rhinelander High School officially began with the start of girls’ and boys’ hockey, gymnastics and girls’ basketball. Three sports had to wait a week, but now boys’ swimming, wrestling and boys’ basketball are all back and student-athletes and coaches are enthusiastic about their teams’ prospects this winter.
Boys’ swimming
While her swimmers showed typical first-day fatigue at the end of practice on Monday, RHS boys’ swimming coach Amber Laggis was pleased with her teams’ effort.
“All the swimmers are feeling it a little bit, since it’s their first day back in the water, doing a little bit longer work-out, it’s hard on all of them. They’re a little bit tired, a little bit sore,” Laggis said.
Laggis divided her swimmers into three groups based on skill level: advanced, intermediate and beginner. The Hodags’ first day of practice wasn’t too challenging as Laggis focused on the basics.
“They did a lot of freestyle, a lot of kicking. Just some things to get them moving, get them back in the water and start building that aerobic base a little bit,” Laggis said. “It wasn’t too bad, but the work’s going to gradually increase.”
Rhinelander’s first meet is Tuesday, Nov. 25 at Stevens Point.
Laggis isn’t sure what the meet’s format will be, but she knows she won’t have much time to get the Hodags prepared.
“It’s just a good beginning meet for the new guys to kind of see what it’s like to be in a swim meet,” Laggis said.
Laggis will use this week to get her new swimmers acclimated with swimming techniques.
“It’s a little hectic, but I’m just trying to get them a taste of everything, so they know what’s going on,” Laggis said. “They’re going to practice start, turns; just trying to get back in the swing of things.”
Wrestling
Similar to past seasons, the RHS wrestling team will not only have to battle larger Wisconsin Valley Conference schools, but also traditional powerhouses like Wisconsin Rapids and Wausau West. But Rhinelander coach Jim Kreitlow has a determined group that’s prepared to work.
“Most of these kids like to work hard. It’s wrestling and wrestling isn’t easy,” Kreitlow said. “It’s a tough sport. Maybe kids don’t like to work as hard as they used too, but we have kids who want to work.”
Kreitlow said 18 kids showed up during Rhinelander’s opening session on Monday. A few of them are young, but have extensive wrestling experience that should help the Hodags this season.
“The kids are enthusiastic, they’re level-headed and I think they realize what their abilities are,” Kreitlow said. “We may not be able to battle with the top teams in the conference, because our numbers aren’t what they should be. Unfortunately, we may have a lot of forfeits and are dual meet scores may not be what we want them to be, but hopefully we can take some satisfaction from wrestling hard and winning some head-to-head battles.”
Monday was the first time the Hodags hit the mat this season, but Kreitlow wasn’t afraid to let his wrestlers toss each other around. Grapplers locked up and worked on take-down techniques toward the end of practice.
“We worked mostly on our feet, keeping a neutral position, our stance, we worked on penetration and a few take-downs,” Kreitlow said. “We worked on our defensive sprawl. We’ll move into a little bit slower the next couple of days, but we’ll get at it pretty hot and heavy pretty quick.”
The Hodags begin the season with a home dual meet against Rapids on Dec. 4.
Boys’ basketball
The Rhinelander boys’ basketball team hit the hardwood for the first time on Monday and it didn’t take long for head coach Rich Fortier to gauge what level his team is on.
“Some guys are in better shape then others, there’s no doubt about that,” Fortier said. “We have our soccer players who are on the top end of the food chain and we have other guys who haven’t done anything, including open gym, who are on the bottom end of the food chain and a little in between.”
About 60 kids showed up on Monday to vie for a roster spot on one of five teams. Fortier said many of his varsity players competed in summer leagues, so he’s hoping those players’ skills are already sharp.
Fortier welcomed 25 freshmen to practice and he used Monday’s session to see what his new players have to offer.
“I want to see how they run, see them shoot a little bit,” Fortier said. “We have to figure out in a pretty short amount of time where guys will play and what their skill level is. We just wanted to get them in space and see how they move.”
Rhinelander will begin the season at Lakeland on Nov. 27. However, the Hodags will scrimmage at Appleton East this Saturday.
“We have East, Green Bay Southwest and Green Bay Notre Dame,” Fortier said. “So we get to scrimmage against three teams that are all better than us and our good, so that will be good for us. But I think we’ll stack up pretty well against them.”
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