PURDUEdad

In fairness to the officials (not only the good ones but also the ones who were clearly for the other team . . .) shouldn't there be a "Bad Spectating" thread to balance this out? Or has that discussion already been fully voiced and brought to an acceptable resolution . . . ?

Something I say to the other referees I'm working with from time to time.
 
"We are going to start the day with 4 referees. The instant the first whistle blows everyone in the building becomes a referee. They will be able to see pins better than us, determine who is stalling and know the exact moment control is gained or lost. The only difference is they aren't going to step in and work a few matches for you when you need to use the restroom or get something to eat."

In a couple of months you're definitely gonna know if she's pregnant, but you're still not gonna know if there was control...

In fairness to the officials (not only the good ones but also the ones who were clearly for the other team . . .) shouldn't there be a "Bad Spectating" thread to balance this out? Or has that discussion already been fully voiced and brought to an acceptable resolution . . . ?

In fairness to the officials (not only the good ones but also the ones who were clearly for the other team . . .) shouldn't there be a "Bad Spectating" thread to balance this out? Or has that discussion already been fully voiced and brought to an acceptable resolution . . . ?

Franklin Community's Burk Van Horn

Franklin Community's Burk Van Horn

Thanks very much for starting this thread!
 
Merry Christmas!

merry christmas eveyone, stay safe with your travels and enjoy the quality time spent with your families! I apologize this post has nothing to do with wrestling

By JEREMY HINES
Thehines7@gmail.com
 
Burk Van Horn remembers being with his dad and brothers driving down the highway on their way to Nebraska, and seeing several cars trying to get their attention. Turns out, Van Horn had accidentally left the gates open on the family’s cattle trailer they were hauling, and some of the cattle was walking toward the opening.
 
“The cows were just about to jump out when we stopped,” Van Horn said. “We had stopped to eat and I checked on the cattle, but forgot to close the gates.”
 
Van Horn is a little more careful these days, both with cattle and on the wrestling mat. He’s currently ranked No. 2 at 160 pounds. He started the season out ranked No. 1 at 170 pounds and later moved to 160 and was given the top ranking there, before the latest polls had Evansville Mater Dei’s Joe Lee moving up to 160 and claiming the top spot.
 
The Franklin Community senior has had a stellar career in high school, but it wasn’t until last season that he really stepped up his game. As a freshman Van Horn advanced to semistate. As a sophomore he was defeated in the first round of regional. But, as a junior, he not only made it to the state tournament – he wrestled his way under the lights at Banker’s Life Fieldhouse. Van Horn lost a 3-0 heartbreaker in the state finals match to two-time champ Jacob Covaciu.
 
“My sophomore year I had a bad match at regionals,” Van Horn said. “But that helped me to become better and motivate myself more. I started to break down matches more. That loss was a setback, but it made me want to go further.
 
“Then, last year when I saw my draw at state, I really felt like I could get under the lights. Just getting there wasn’t my goal. I wanted to win, not get second.”
 
Franklin coach Bob Hasseman said losing in regional as a sophomore was a turning point in Van Horn’s career.
 
“It was a crappy match and things happened that was a little out of his control with the officiating,” Hasseman said. “At that time, when something didn’t go his way, Burk could get a little discombobulated. But since that time, and probably because of that time, he has learned to keep on rolling and to take the good with the bad. He’s going to make mistakes. He’s going to get bad calls. That’s wrestling. But he has to stay focused and keep wrestling and not make a grave error when he’s frustrated.”
 
Van Horn has mixed emotions about the rankings this year. He likes the fact that he was ranked No. 1 at two different classes. He likes that he has a target on his back and a lot of guys are trying to knock him off. But he doesn’t like when kids get intimidated just because of his ranking.
 
“I’ve still got a lot of room to improve before I can become a state champ,” he said. “I’m just another kid out there wrestling. There are sometimes I wish I wasn’t ranked because a lot of kids won’t wrestle me. Or, if they do wrestle, some of them just roll to their backs like little girls instead of at least putting up a fight. But it is fun walking onto the mat and knowing that you’re the man.”
 
Van Horn has made weight once at 160, but plans to go back to 170. At this point, he’s not sure where he will wrestle in the tournament.
 
“I’m going to do whatever is best for the team,” he said.
 
Burk started wrestling about the time he learned to walk. He has two older brothers that were state qualifiers.
 
“Burk is quite a bit bigger than his brothers were,” Franklin coach Bob Hasseman said. “He’s got the size and he’s very talented. His whole family seems to be just genetically strong. He has good hips and is very rarely out of position on the mat. His body build also helps him tremendously.”
 
Burk is the epitome of being country strong. His daily routine of wrestling and then going home and working with the cattle and his show pigs has helped him develop a habit of hard working.
 
“I show pigs and cattle year around,” Burk said. “It’s a lot of hard work. If you want to win in the show ring, or in wrestling, you have to be willing to put in the hard work.”
 
Van Horn is hoping all his hard work produces an end result of a state championship this season.
 
Click here to view the article

If Joe Lee had lost yesterday, the lights on the west side of Evansville would still be dimmed yet today . . .

OK, where is Mundell with the exact details when we need him.....
 
That was a pretty special season for Indiana wrestling and here's the way I recall that season.
 
Portage and Hobart was in the Harvest Classic that year and I believe Portage came out on top, but it was crazy close..and there was a fight in the bleacher between the parents of each school.  The die hard region guys can tell you that family names of both teams knew each other for years (some good relationships and some bad....but still with region tension between them!)
 
The dual that season was at Portage.  We split matches 7-7 and Hobart ended on top by 1 and six of the 14 matches were decided in the last minute of the match.  It took me a couple days to get over losing and I though to myself, "that was the best dual meet I've ever seen".
 
Then we wrestled Hobart in the Team Regional at CP.  Again the dual came down to the last match, teams split matches 7-7 and I think 10 of the matches were decided in the last minute.  It took me a couple days to get over losing and I thought o myself, "ok, THAT was the best duall meet I've ever seen".
 
I watched the team state dual between EMD and Hobart.  Couldn't believe that Hobart was for sure going to knock out invincible EMD and then watched the crazy ending of that dual...in that environment.  It only took me 10 seconds to say, "OK, I'll never see a better dual meet than that one"
 
...not sure if I have.

Team State semi-finals:
 
Evansville Mater Dei 33, Hobart 30
103 -- Manuel Rodriguez (H) dec. Bob Ausbrooks (EMD), 2-1.
112 -- Ryan Storey (H) dec. Matt Adler (EMD), 8-3.
119 -- Alexander Ramos (H) dec. Eli Todich (EMD), 22-5, disqualification, 5:58.
125 -- Wes Goodpaster (H) pinned Mike Conkling (EMD), 2:19. 
130 -- Chad Martin (EMD) dec. Josh Felty (H), 9-7. 
135 -- Chad Raben (EMD), Rick Rayner (H), 2-1.
140 -- Neil Reddington (EMD) pinned John Felty (H), 3:21.
145 -- Frank DeBusk (H) pinned Dan Jankowski (EMD), 1:10.
152 -- Joe Hurst (H) pinned Eric Dewig (EMD), 4:49. 
160 -- Nick Miller (EMD) dec. John Cantu (H), 8-3.
171 -- Tony Unfried (EMD) dec. Nicholas Benzce (H), 6-5.
189 -- Ryan King (EMD) dec. Dustin Weber (H), 9-5. 
215 -- Kevin Alvey (EMD) pinned John Walsh (H), 1:21. 
275 -- David Hisch (EMD) pinned Trent Overturf (H), 3:21.
 
For my money, the greatest dual meet in Indiana history.  It's hard to explain how unbeatable Mater Dei was at that time.  They hadn't lost from the time the team tournament was introduced in 1995-96 and didn't end up losing until 2004--finishing at 9 titles in a row, including the last of the current IHSAA team champion system in 1994-95.  In this dual, Hobart had already wrestled far over their heads when DeBusk takes it to another level by tossing and sticking the virtually invincible Jankowski, whose only previous loss all year was by 1 point to the national champ Rosbottom of Jeffersonville.  The place was pandemonium.  Then Hurst pins a very good Dewig too and we could all barely breathe.  Nick Miller comes up with a clutch win over Cantu, and then all heck breaks loose.  Nick Benzce has no business even being in the match with Unfried--he'd just gotten pinned in under a minute by him the week before.  But he wrestles the match of his life and is up a couple points late.  At that point, there are lots of versions of what exactly happened, but the bottom line is this: Benzce is dancing around with the best stalling effort he can muster and the EMD section is going insane.  It's so loud you can't hear yourself think in what shockingly turned out to be an undersized Center Grove venue for this gigantic match.  It's so loud, Benzce doesn't hear the ref screaming at him that he's being called for stalling.  And again. And again.  Before it's all said and done, there are a few seconds left, and Unfried is up a point without Benzce even having realized and Unfried is able to run out the clock.  From there, King controls Weber and Alvey and Hisch get enormous pins and the EMD faithful are crying tears of joy while Hobart and anyone not from EMD can't believe what we just saw.
 
For me, it's the greatest match ever because there has only ever been that type of aura of invincibility surrounding a team in a dual meet situation with EMD.  Prior to 1995, there was no team state, and no one has come close to matching their sort of run.  It would have been clearly the greatest upset, even until now, in Indiana dual meet history.  And the fact that it came that close to happening, in those circumstances, made it truly legendary.

Thank you. Coach Hasseman came to Franklin thirty years ago and accepted the challenge of building a program that to that point hadn't had very much success. Franklin is still not a very big high school (around 1,600) but his hard work (and, perhaps, hard head . . .) has paid off.
 
While there have been a few of his high school wrestlers (and maybe even a ref or two) that he has "gently nurtured" from the sidelines, it is a hoot to watch him with the little kids in Franklin's club.
 
I doubt he visits the forum much . . . His dial-up webernet thingy is probably too much of a hassle . . .

Heck, I was at a tourney last year and that old Coach Hasseman was reffing.  My little knucklehead Mikey was wrestling and doing some kind of crazy stuff.  He was only 5 and Hassman asked "Who is teaching this kid how to wrestle"?  I pointed at Tonte.  He just laughed.  What a great coach you guys have.  Wouldn't want to go through his workouts though. 

Actually, Burk wore Franklin's new singlet in his win against Warren earlier in the day, but for some reason opted to wear one of the older ones under the lights . . .
 
See, he may be a little old school too, like Coach Hasseman.
 
Speaking of Coach Hasseman, I imagine he spends more time caring about the wrestler in the singlet than the singlet on the wrestler...

Actually, Burk wore Franklin's new singlet in his win against Warren earlier in the day, but for some reason opted to wear one of the older ones under the lights . . .
 
See, he may be a little old school too, like Coach Hasseman.
 
Speaking of Coach Hasseman, I imagine he spends more time caring about the wrestler in the singlet than the singlet on the wrestler...

I wouldn't say many

Actually, Burk wore Franklin's new singlet in his win against Warren earlier in the day, but for some reason opted to wear one of the older ones under the lights . . .
 
See, he may be a little old school too, like Coach Hasseman.
 
Speaking of Coach Hasseman, I imagine he spends more time caring about the wrestler in the singlet than the singlet on the wrestler...

Actually, Burk wore Franklin's new singlet in his win against Warren earlier in the day, but for some reason opted to wear one of the older ones under the lights . . .
 
See, he may be a little old school too, like Coach Hasseman.
 
Speaking of Coach Hasseman, I imagine he spends more time caring about the wrestler in the singlet than the singlet on the wrestler...

Kind of nice to see three of the ol' Mooresville Sectional class of '60 (uh, 160, that is . . .) make it all the way to the final four.
 
Congrats!

Old.   Stodgy.   Out of touch.   Clueless.   Oblivious.  Don’t get it.   Outdated.  
 
This is how my grandchildren and children describe me.
 
Honestly, I dislike most people under 35.   I do not get social media.   The whole of idea of ‘being famous’ on Twitter or Facebook is a farce.   The narcissism of so many young people is completely foreign.   And social media is just a stupidity amplifier for the selfish foolishness of millennials. 
 
There is one group of people under 35 I still can relate to and that’s wrestlers.   I can talk to a kid who wrestles for hours.   There isn’t much selfishness in these kids.   These are really damn good kids. 
 
That got me thinking.   Wrestling is really the most humbling thing a person can do.   At least in my opinion.   Even our greatest wrestlers ever, guys like Ellis and Tsirtis and Palmer, have been beat and pinned at some point.   If you’ve ever wrestled, you been humbled.   Probably multiple times.
 
So many kids today really have no idea what failure is.   I watched the video of that girl at Yale screaming and I could not believe it.   Halloween costumes are now offensive and cause a person to emotional convulse?  Really?  Too many soft people.   Too many people who have never failed.   Too many people who have never been challenged. 
 
I see so many wrestlers perform so admirably in adulthood.   And I honestly think it is because so many of these kids failed.   They failed plenty of times in wrestling matches.   And they were taught to get back up and do it all over again.   Don’t quit.   Don’t stop fighting. 
 
Wrestling provides these kids armor for life.   If they lose a job or something does not go their way, they don’t immediately crumble.   They move on.   And they certainly don’t fall to pieces over made up transgression like Halloween costumes or micro aggressions. 
 
These kids who wrestle are probably the one thing that give me some glimmer of hope for the future.
 
End of old man's rant.

Fixed it for ya

He didn't know that you knew someone that knew someone that knew Nick would be back is my guess. Good to know someone that knows the inside scoop. Lol