St. Mary’s Drew Steidler is headed to his fourth consecutive state final

Bismarck High School has put some distance between themselves and the rest of the field.  The Demons put six wrestlers through to the finals, and in doing so created a fifty point edge over second place Dickinson heading into tomorrow’s wrestleback round.  Chase Dockter (285), Christian Tanefeu (106), Wilfried Tanefeu (113), Laken Boese (120), Ryan Ripplinger, and Brandt Kringlie (152) will all look to add their name-some another time-to the wall of the Bismarck High wrestling room.  Dockter won his match with Mandan’s Levi Haugen from the top position.  The senior returning state champion rode Haugen out for the entirety of the third period for a 1-0 decision.  Dockter will wrestle Valley City’s Jaden Oestern in tomrrow 285 pound final.  The Tanefeu brother both recorded bonus in their semifinal bouts,  106 Christian via 19-3 technical fall and WIlfried by 14-6 major decision.  Christian will tilt tomorrow afternoon with Aden Braun of Jamestown.  Braun defeated Century’s Kaden DeCoteau 13-9.  Wilfried will get one more chance at Minot #1 seed Kelby Armstrong.  Armstrong scored a 5-0 win over Jamestown’s Joel Bowman.  Laken Boese may have had the most impressive day of any Demon, defeating returning state champion Ethan Bowman of Jamestown 8-2, and then bumping to 132 in the state dual finals and beating Dickinson’s #2 ranked Jaron Berger.  Boese is in for quite the battle again tomorrow as he will go up against Century’s Clay Randez.  Radenz is 3-0 against Boese this season.  Ryan Ripplinger has been nothing short of dominant in this tournament.  Looking for his fourth state title, Ripplinger scored a second period technical fall over Turtle Mountain’s Tate Laducer.   Bismarck’s last state finalist got there by the most razor thin of margins.  It took Brandt Kringlie until tiebreaker 1, but he outlasted Williston’s Raif Horswill to advance to his first state final.

Second place Dickinson battled hard in the wrestle back to close the gap on the lead Bismarck built up Thursday night, but the Midgets went 2-3 in the semifinals. Dickinson lost their only one seed, senior Tate Nordby, 3-1 in sudden victory to Mandan’s Kolton Reisenauer. They also lost two two seeds in 182 Tanner Jarrett and 132 Jaron Berger.  Like Nordby, Jarrett was defeated in sudden victory by a familiar opponent.  Jacob Carmichael of Minot won with a two in overtime to send Jarrett to the wrestlebacks.  Berger fell to Williston’s Dalton McKenzie 7-2.  Dickinson’s two semifinal winners were Brendan Johnson and Troy Berg.  Johnson out dueled Bismarck’s Brock Fettig 13-9 and will wrestle St. Mary’s undefeated sophomore Reece Barnhardt in the finals.  Berg pinned Valley City’s Parker Larson in 5:13 and will take on Ripplinger tomorrow afternoon.

Mandan sits soundly in third place on the strength of three finalists back to back to back.  Kolton Reisenauer will be joined by teammates Will Kleinknecht (145) and Ethan Fleck.  Kleinknecht defeated Minot’s Trevon McClaanahan 3-2, and will wrestle upset-minded #4 seed Matthew Rader in the finals.  Rader defeated #1 Noah Braun 5-2.  Wrestling from the top seed, Ethan Fleck defeated Davies senior Connor Chloupek 6-4.  There was some disappointment for the Braves though, as senior #1 seed Jacob Boehm was defeated by Jamestown’s Paul Vandal 10-8.  Vandal will wrestle South’s Isaiah Gates in tomorrow’s 220 pound final.

At 132 pounds, St. Mary’s Central junior Drew Steidler advanced to the state finals for the fourth consecutive year with a pin of Watford City’s Liam Shannon.  Steidler will look to get his first title against Williston’s Dalton McKenzie.

Davies sent the lowest seeded Class A wrester to the finals in #6 Kolbe Booker.  Booker defeated Williston’s Comstock Krenz 7-5 and will wrestle Mandan’s Reisenauer.

The semifinal round started with a big upset at 170.  Turtle Mountain’s Nolan Demery handled Davies senior and returning state finalist Jaden Mairs 7-2.  Demery will wrestle Will Rohrich of Grand Forks Central tomorrow afternoon after Rohrich neat Colby Rance of Devils Lake 8-3.

Cade Pederson of West Fargo is back in the finals for the third consecutive year.  The 2017 Packer state champion defeated Bismarck’s Connor McGregor 15-4 and will wrestle Minot’s Jacob Carmichael in the finals.

Matt Kaylor of Legacy will look to add a third title to his resume tomorrow when he faces Josh Jrump of Wahpeton.  Krump upset #2 Shane Kennedy of West Fargo Sheyenne 5-4 to advance.