DILWORTH – Detroit Lakes head coach Rob Ullyott knew his team had no margin for error heading into the first night of the Section 8-2A wrestling tournament. After a dominating win over Roseau, the Lakers upset Dilworth-Glyndon-Felton 40-32 to advance to the semifinal round.
On Tuesday, the Lakers took a few risks to gain an edge over the Rebels. The first came at 120-pounds after Beau Somdahl (113) evened the match 6-6 with a fall victory over Sam Schmitz. Ullyott was tasked with filling senior captain Cole Weber's shoes, who did not compete due to an injury.
"We made a move at 120 and moved Leroy (LaCrosse) up to 126, which is where Cole Weber was supposed to wrestle," Ullyott said. "He gutted out a one-point win that was one of those matches that came down to the final seconds."
The next swing came at 160 pounds when Brock Sweirs picked up a 7-6 decision win over Thomas Thurdeen. It was a valuable three points that followed pin victories from Bradly Sweirs (138) and Tyson Ullyott (145) and a 17-5 major decision win from Cade Okeson (152).
"One of those big swing matches we talked about was we ran Brock Swiers, who's our backup 145-pounder. We weighed him in at 152 tonight, and he went all the way to 160," Ullyott said. "He got a one-point win for us there-- great effort tonight. He went out and dominated on his feet tonight. He gave up some points but dominated on his feet."
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In wrestling, sometimes the best wins are close losses. For Connor Zamzo, a 1-0 defeat at 195 pounds set the table for Jeffrey Moen at 285-pounds to push the Lakers to the semifinals.
"Connor Zamzo was pinned by their 195-pounder at our place earlier in the year," Ullyott said. "It came down to a one-point match that we ended up losing at 195, but to gut out that kind of match is a big deal… Connor did such a great job. His job was to keep it a decision, and he did, and was in a position to win. He's improved tremendously."
"He's kind of grown up a bit," Ullyott said of Moen. "This was his first full year starting. He had some starts for us last year, but it's his spot this year. He's learning how to win, and you win by sticking to the game plan. We have a set of things that we're focusing on with him, and he's starting to narrow in that focus instead of throwing the kitchen sink at somebody. That discipline is turning him into a pretty solid heavyweight."
On Dec. 10, Detroit Lakes dropped its only previous meeting with DGF 33-28. After some impactful injuries to a few senior Lakers in the later part of the season, Ullyott was aware that his squad needed to steal any toss-up match to keep their section championship hopes alive.
"Every one of them," Ullyott said of the swing matches going Detroit Lakes' way. "Our guys really dug down deep tonight. Even in the matches we lost, there was a tremendous amount of effort. I saw guys fighting off their back that sometimes don't fight a lot off their back."
Before the Lakers knocked off the Rebels, they had to get past Roseau. The Rams came in as the sixth seed in the West sub-section and didn't pose much of a challenge. Detroit Lakes, the third seed in the West, beat Roseau 82-0 to advance to wrestle the second-seeded Rebels.
"Our whole focus was DFG, but what it did do was allow us to give some kids that wouldn't get a match," Ulyott said of the win over Roseau. "We ended up getting some wins with some guys that don't get a lot of wrestling… Our whole goal was to go there and learn how to focus. We're wrestling Roseau, and they're a depleted team, but this was a night of wrestling. This wasn't a dual. We needed to focus on DGF right away with our game plan. You start that in the Roseau match."
The road only gets tougher as the East's top seed, Pequot Lakes-Pine River-Backus, is set to take on Detroit Lakes at Lakeshirts Fieldhouse on Saturday. The final four was scheduled for Friday before the tournament was postponed to Saturday. On the other side of the bracket, Perham and Thief River Falls will battle for the other spot in the Section 8-2A championship match. Perham, the East's third seed, upset Alexandria 53-24 to advance.
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"I just want us to wrestle hard," Ullyott said. "We're obviously the big underdog. There's no question about that. If we go out on (Saturday) night and give the effort we gave tonight, I'll be proud of that. They wrestled so hard, and I couldn't be more proud of them. That's the meat and potatoes of our sport."
DETROIT LAKES 40, DGF 32
106 – Gabe Schmitz (DGF) over Talan Baker (DL) Fall 0:39; 113 – Beau Somdahl (DL) over Sam Schmitz (DGF) Fall 3:05; 120 – Jacob Luebke (DGF) over Everett Northup (DL) Fall 3:21; 126 – LeRoy LaCrosse (DL) over Alex Anderson (DGF) Dec 5-3; 132 – Austin Lenhart (DGF) over Cody Bartnes (DL) TF 16-0; 138 – Bradly Swiers (DL) over Camden Mustachia (DGF) Fall 5:48; 145 – Tyson Ullyott (DL) over Ben Thureen (DGF) Fall 0:26; 152 – Cade Okeson (DL) over Roy Rude (DGF) Maj 17-5; 160 – Brock Swiers (DL) over Thomas Thureen (DGF) Dec 7-6; 170 – Cade Jackson (DL) over Casey Macziewski (DGF) Fall 2:42; 182 – Jordan Summers (DGF) over Cameron Cannon (DL) Fall 0:38; 195 – Caleb Johnson (DGF) over Connor Zamzo (DL) Dec 1-0; 220 – Bryce Fischer (DGF) over Tynan Simpson (DL) Fall 3:08; 285 – Jeffery Moen (DL) over Aiden Edeen (DGF) Fall 1:46
