Virga gets 100th victory

Chisago Lakes Legends Wrestling Tourney Joe Virga continued to create a legend of his own at the Chisago Lakes Legends Wrestling Tourney last Friday, January 25 at Chisago Lakes High School. Virga was named the tournament MVP by the coaches after winning the 160 pound weight class and also won his 100th career match.

The Wildcats had three other individual champions at the Legends Tourney: Dylan Connell (126), Quade Zupko (138) and Jonah Westbury (285). Because of match limits and injuries, the just 11 Wildcats wrestled in this tournament, including two – Kyle Schoenecker and Nathan Graeve – at 120.

The shorthanded Wildcats still managed to finish third in the team standings, trailing only tournament champions Hutchinson and second place Big Lake. Wildcat head coach Shawn Frederixon said “All of our injured guys will be back in time for the section duals. Right now, it’s all about getting ready for that.”

Virga, ranked seventh at 152 pounds, pinned Tyrese Jackson of Spring Lake Park at 2:40 of the first round in the quarterfinals. Virga decisioned Charlie Schmid of Orono 3-0 in the semifinals. Schmid is ranked sixth at 160. And in the championship match, Virga beat Chris Schmidt of Hutchinson, ranked two place ahead of Virga at 152, 2-1. Wildcat head coach Shawn Frederixon said “I would say Joe Virga had toughest route of anyone at the tournament. All seven of the kids in his weight class had winning records. In typical Joe Virga fashion, he goes after the highest ranked kids in the section and finds a way to knock off one after another. He’s pretty fun to watch. Some of the kids he wrestled make him look small. He’s doing a heck of a good job.”

Connell won both of his matches by tech fall to earn the crown, including a 15-0 win over Tyler Karl of Hutchinson in the championship match. Zupko pinned his first two opponents in a total of 45 seconds before beating Josiah Brown of Big Lake 7-2 in the championship match.

Westbury pinned all three of his opponents. In Westbury’s opening match, if you looked down to grab a handful of popcorn at the start, by the time you looked up it was over. He pinned Henry Olson of Mahtomedi in just seven seconds. In the championship match, he pinned Zach Mahan of Orono, ranked ninth at 220 pounds, at 3:39. Schoenecker’s championship match went into overtime tied at 3-3. Near the end of the first overtime, Schoenecker nearly completed a takedown for the win. But his opponent, Riley Drew of Hutchinson, countered the move and got a takedown at the buzzer for a 5-3 sudden death win.

Eric Brown lost to Dillon Parpart of New Richland 3-1 in overtime in his semifinal match. Frederixon was pleased with his team’s overall performance. “I knew Hutchinson was pretty tough and Big Lake was returning a lot of kids from when they won it last year. I thought we wrestled well and really had some boys step up on Friday night. Quade just kept it going in his typical Quade fashion. He’s 32-1 and is having an outstanding senior year. Dylan Connell continues to go out there and dominate people.”

The gym will be rockin’ as the Wildcats will head up County Road 14 to take on archrival North Branch at North Branch High School tonight at 7 p.m. Frederixon said “North Branch is having an excellent year. They’ve got some tough, gritty kids who work hard and fight. We know they’re going to bring it at another level when they go against us. It will probably be a match that will be decided by the heavyweights at the end and we’ve each got a pretty good one.”