The Belle Fourche AAU Club had 21 state qualifiers this year. The tournament was held over 3 days in the attached original arena at the Denny Sanford Premier Center in Sioux Falls. On Friday, March 20th, the 14U and USAW Freestyle Juniors competed all the way through their brackets to the podium in a single day tournament.
The Broncs had 3 ladies place in the 14U division, Madalynn Rhoads placed 8th, AnnaBelle Dighton placed 5th and Charlie Huston placed 4th in their respective weight classes.
The 14U boys division for the Broncs had 2 placers, Logan Gleason at 3rd and Jaxon Linch at 2nd. The USAW Freestyle Juniors division Broncs saw both Broncs place as well with Luke Tonsager at 3rd and Caden Swaney at 2nd.
On Saturday, March 21st there were 2 sessions of wrestling held with 6U and 8U running through the “blood rounds” just before placing matches in the morning and the 10U and 12U divisions running through the blood rounds in the afternoon.
Those that made it to the placing rounds wrestled placing matches after the Parade of Athletes on Sunday morning, March 22nd.
The Broncs had 2 boys in the 8U division place, Brooks Lynch at 7th and Easton Swaney at 8th, and 2 girls place, Mila Hudson at 5th and Riley Mehlhaff at 8th. The boys 10U Broncs had a 6th place finisher, Nash Lafrentz, and the girls 10U had an 8th place finisher, Nora Hodge. In the 12U boys division, Bayzen Curtis placed 7th and in the girls 12U division, Gracie Hodge placed 5th.
Moving the 14U division to Friday with the Freestyle wrestlers alleviated the congestion for Saturday in the original attached arena at the Premier Center, which holds a capacity of just over 5,000.
On Saturday alone, there were 527 athletes competing in the morning session and 728 athletes competing in the afternoon session, according to Sioux Empire Wrestling.
The 14U division had a record number of registered athletes this year and used all 8 mats of the arena.
The Juniors division was moved to a conference room with 2 mats and chairs for spectators moved in. As wrestling continues to grow in numbers, venues to house the state competition has been narrowed.
The competition was historically held in The Corn Palace, then went to a 4 year rotation among Aberdeen, Brookings, Rapid City and Sioux Falls until outgrowing the capacity of Brookings and Aberdeen, leaving an alternate between Rapid City’s Monument and Sioux Falls’ Premier Center.
For wrestlers still looking for off season competition, next weekend will be Black Hills Nationals hosted in Rapid City at the James Kjerstad Event Center.
Read the full issue of the Belle Fourche Beacon by clicking here.
