Wrestling: No easy road for Willmar Cardinals

Dec. 7—WILLMAR — The Willmar wrestling team isn't going to make anything easy on itself this season.

The standards remain high for the Cardinals. They are ranked 12th in the Class AAA preseason poll in The Gullotine, a statewide wrestling publication. Willmar's looking to win its 10th straight Central Lakes Conference championship and extend its 73-dual match win streak in the CLC.

And along the way, they'll wrestle high-caliber teams with the goal of making a state-wide impact.

"We have a whole bunch of tough matches scheduled for our guys," said Willmar head coach Ed Oehlers. "We stuck in some duals that have a good balance and have tough teams like ours."

The Cardinals opened the season last Thursday with a triangular in Anoka. They beat the host Tornadoes 39-24 and lost to Mora 42-25.

"We started off kind of slow," said senior captain Braeden Erickson, "but once we got going and started wrestling a little better, we were uniting as a team."

Last season, the Cardinals made state for the second straight year and 11th time overall. They were 0-2 at state with losses to Stillwater (43-26) and Northfield (35-34).

Willmar brings back four of its six individual state qualifiers from 2021-22: Conlan Carlson, Sully Anez, Cavin Carlson and Ivan Mares.

Led by those four, the Cardinals' middleweights will be a formidable force on the mat. Conlan Carlson, a sophomore captain, is ranked third at 138. Anez is fifth at 132. Mares is seventh at 120 and Cavin is eighth at 126.

"Us middle guys, I think we're feeling pretty good," said Conlan, who finished as the Class AAA runner-up at 126 pounds in '21-'22. "The heavier guys are still developing but I think they have the potential to get there. The light guys, we have a lot of young guys there.

"I think we can be strong."

During the summer, Conlan wrestled at the USMC/USAW 16U National Championships in freestyle and Greco-Roman in July at Fargo, North Dakota. He also competed freestyle for Team Minnesota Blue at the 16U National Duals in Loves Park, Illinois in June.

"Definitely having that physical part along with all my technique so going into that match, I'm going to be stronger and I'm going to want it more than the other guy," Conlan said about what he worked on in the off-season. "There's definitely some guys out there that kind of kicked my butt, but it taught me a lot."

Going deeper in the lineup, Erickson is another pillar, ranking seventh at 170. After missing out on the state tournament the last three seasons, Erickson is looking to make the final 16 for the first time since eighth grade.

"I'm just focused on having fun this year and enjoying the sport; I think that's where I excel and do my best in wrestling," Erickson said. "If I'm having fun, that's all that really matters to me."

During the season-opening triangular, Erickson said he was impressed with a pair of younger talent in eighth-grader Lawson Anez and sophomore Finley Donelan. Lawson wrestled at 113 while Donelan was at 285.

"Lawson's shown a lot of strengths; I think he can compete with the guys pretty well," Erickson said. "Finley at heavyweight, he's showing some signs. He can really start beating some of these kids up at the higher weights."

Oehlers added, "Lawson was a seventh-grader in the lineup last year and he took some lumps being new to high school. He really impressed us and had a different demeanor. ... He did really well (in the triangular)."

Willmar took on its first ranked team in Mora (eighth, Class AA). In the Cardinals' home-opening triangular at 5 p.m. Thursday, they'll host a pair of ranked squads in Waconia (fifth, AAA) and Belgrade-Brooten-Elrosa (fourth, A).

They'll also compete in the Eden Prairie Duals on Jan. 7 and the Kiffmeyer Duals in St. Cloud on Jan. 14. For individual tournaments, Willmar is at the Rochester Christmas Tournament on Dec. 16-17, and the Hutchinson invite on Jan. 21.

"One thing I talked to the whole team about is that guys are going to out-class many of us on this team ... we need to be able to stay in the match and try to monopolize our strengths, even if we don't get the victory," Oehlers said. "Sometimes you can keep it close enough to where (the opponent) wears out and is like 'Holy smokes, how's this guy still with me?' It's kind of like Rocky Balboa where this guy won't go down.

"We do have to get into that conditioning to where we can do that."

Winners of the last two Section 8AAA championships, the Cardinals should be among the favorites in a deep field. Willmar is the only 8AAA team ranked in the preseason polls, but Bemidji, Brainered and St. Cloud are all in the Lean and Mean (honorable mentions). Last season, Willmar beat Bemidji for the section title, 29-25. The Cardinals and Lumberjacks have met for the section title five years in a row.

"We're hungry to go back and to win again and hopefully do better (at state)," Erickson said. "And wrestling the way we want to instead of the other team dictate how we wrestle."

Conlan added, "We have all the talent we need. We just have to execute now."