EVANSVILLE — Monroe took third at the WIAA Division 2 Evansville wrestling regional Feb. 9. More importantly, the Cheesemakers are sending seven grapplers to the Feb. 16 sectionals at Adams-Friendship.

“Preparation this week was just ‘find a way to win,’” Monroe head coach Tom Witt said. “It doesn’t matter how you do it, you just find a way to win and advance.”

Evansville-Albany won the team title with 229.5 points, with Edgerton second (202.5), followed by Monroe (178), Beloit Turner (161.5), Sugar River (119), Brodhead-Juda (116) and Clinton (62).

The Cheesemakers had three champions: Patrick Rielly at 160-pounds, Alex Witt at 170 and Bodie Minder at 220. Also advancing for Monroe include Brady Schuh (106), Garrett Voegeli (113), Julian Gruber (182) and Kelsey Domingez (195).

“It’s kind of how conference went. The guys that scored a lot of points for us this year were the same guys that are moving on to sectionals,” Tom Witt said.

Sugar River advances last year’s state qualifier Joe Quaglia (126), as well as Robert Chenoweth (145), Jack Diederich (152) and Daniel Enloe (285). For Brodhead-Juda, Jackson Hauri, the state’s top-ranked wrestler at 152, went unbeaten to move on, while teammates Brian McCullough (145) and Jayson Starr (138) also advanced.

“I thought we had a really good day. Coming in, I was hoping to get four kids through,” Brodhead-Juda coach Bill Davis said. “The kids that made it through had a really good day. Starr really wrestled well at 138, at 145 McCoullough had a really good day, and at 152, Jackson Hauri came out and dominated that weight class.”

Hauri, the state’s runner-up a year ago at 152, has been a man on a mission for the past 12 months, seeking out that elusive state championship. The Cardinals senior pinned each of his competitors at the regional, including Diederich (25-14) in the championship in 3:16.

“(I’ve) definitely been a man on a mission. I’ve put everything aside. This is my last go-round and I want to make everything count,” Hauri said. “There’s going to be really good competition next weekend and I’ll have to be prepared.”

Rielly (28-4) missed the first weeks of the wrestling season while recovering from a football injury but has since found his groove. At the regional, Rielly had a bye in the first round and then pinned Evansville-Albany’s Josh Pappadakis (35-8) in 53 seconds. In the championship, Rielly battled Edgerton’s Trevor Wilkinson to the end before winning 3-1.

“I was mentally focused. I was prepared Friday night. I was thinking about my matches and thinking about what I was going to do and how I was going to accomplish what I was going to do,” Rielly said. “It feels pretty good. Last year I got first at this place, too.”

In the next match on the championship mat, Alex Witt (38-6) battled Turner’s Cal Ries (28-15) and Ries’ flailing headgear 9-3. 

“Last week I took second at conference and I was not happy with myself,” Alex Witt said. “I wanted to win really bad, so this week I really picked up the tempo to get better in practice and to get in better shape, and I’ll just keep on doing it next week. Go to state, that’s the goal — that’s always the goal.”

Minder (36-8) went 2-0, pinning Evansville-Albany’s Cutter Lange (16-16) in 47 seconds in the semifinals and then holding off a late push by Turner’s Cody Krueger (31-7) 7-5.

In the championship match at 195, Domingez (18-7), who moved down from heavyweight, was pinned by Turner’s Drew Ries (21-3) in 3:37. Domingez and Gruber (32-12), who lost to Clinton’s Zach Wynstra (35-2) both dropped weight classes based on their best chances to move on not only to sectionals, but possibly to state.

“Julian and Kelsey, bringing them down probably helped them. Kelsey I don’t think he makes it at heavyweight — those kids are just too big for him to handle. Julian has actually been weighing 188-189 all year, so it wasn’t far,” Tom Witt said. “Part of the reason about it — and I tried to ask (Gruber) about it beforehand — was looking ahead to sectionals and his chances to move on after next weekend are better at 182 than 195. There are three kids (at 195) that we know he can’t beat, so we will see if (the move) works out for us.”

Voegeli (13-6) also changed weight classes, moving up a level from 106. Voegeli was pinned by Evansville-Albany’s Camden Staver (24-11) in the first-place match, and then won his wrestle-back against Brodhead-Juda’s Braden Erb (18-16) by a 17-13 decision.

“We had Garrett (Voegeli) wrestle off Kyle (Haldiman) before conference. Kyle then would wrestle conference and Garrett regionals. Part of it was our conference tournament is really tough and I didn’t want (Voegeli) to take on more losses than he already had. He had a 10-5 record coming in and was the one-seed,” Tom Witt said. “Garrett did a great job. I kind of figured he would take second even though he was the one-seed, but he did a great job in that last match (wrestleback) to win, so he’s our seventh kid going to sectionals.”

Schuh, Monroe’s 106 all season, moved to 26-10 on the year with a 12-3 major decision semifinal win over Gunner Katzenmeyer (23-16) of Evansville-Albany. Schuh lost to Edgerton’s Ryen Hazzard (34-7) in the first-place match 3-1.

“He was great. I think he wrestled better in his finals match than he did in his semifinals. He made more mistakes in his semifinal match and gave up some points he probably shouldn’t have given up. Losing 3-1 to a guy that’s ranked 7 or 8 in division 2, and he’s a big kid that’s come down from 113 where he’s been most of the year. Brady was a takedown away from tying it, so it was a great job by Brady,” Tom Witt said.

Elsewhere for the Cheesemakers, freshman Lukas Broitzman was fifth at 120, Dakota Wickstrum finished sixth at 126, Jace Amacher was sixth at 138, Liam Hermanson took fourth at 145, Gabe Witt was fifth at 152 and Austin Cameron was sixth at 285.

“We’ve got to give Gabe (Witt) some props here — a senior whose career is now done after losing the first-round match. He’s a kid that never complains and works hard and does what you ask him to do. I’m proud of Gabe for what he’s done for Monroe wrestling,” Tom Witt said.

Brodhead-Juda just missed out on having five wrestlers advance. Erb and Russell Waeffler (19-14, 120 pounds) both lost their wrestle-back matches and took third. Seth Mansfield took fourth at 106, Cole Hoesly was fourth at 160, Blaine Berget fifth at 170 and Mario Reyes sixth at 132.

Sugar River, similar to Brodhead-Juda, had low numbers all year that hurt in dual meet competitions. But in the setting of regionals, it gave the Raiders a chance to prove their mettle.

“We’ve got a pretty tough regional here, so if we do well here, I think we’ll do well at sectionals as well,” Sugar River coach Peter Swenson said. “Anything can shake out at sectionals.”

Brian Hollis (132), Cade Femrite (138), Holden Latsch (160) and Chase Messner (220) all took fifth for the Raiders, while Lance Varney (182) was sixth.

“For a team that — I have a lot of guys that this year was their first varsity experience — it was good to see them take these steps this year. To have two regional champs is pretty good, with Joe and Robbie,” Swenson said. “We continue to practice all the way through as a team. As I say, if we don’t make it on, this is where we start getting better for next year, and for the guys wrestling for sectionals, this is our chance to push them as hard as we can. Even though it’s an individual sport, there is still a lot of teamwork that goes on through next week.”

Sectionals is set for Feb. 16 at Adams-Friendship High School. Weigh-in will be at 9:30 a.m. with the coaches meeting at 10 a.m. and the first session of matches beginning at 11.

“We go up the night before, stay in a hotel. We can sit around make fun and tell jokes. We just get to take our mind off of wrestling and don’t have to hurry too much,” Hauri said, adding that having teammates with him at sectionals “definitely helps” with the focus and attitude needed to advance.