Three Mahomet-Seymour wrestlers place at IWCOA state meet
By FRED KRONER
Three Mahomet-Seymour varsity wrestlers earned state medals and All-State honors on Friday (June 25) in the IWCOA Class 2A tournament at the Bank of Springfield Center.
Sophomore Mateo Casillas – unbeaten until the state championship match at 195 pounds – was the state runner-up after a 3-1 loss to Washington’s Donnie Hidden.
Bulldog teammates Brennan Houser (182 pounds) and Daniel Renshaw (220 pounds) each won their last bout and took home fifth-place medals.
Eight M-S athletes qualified for state. Seven competed. Senior Logan Hillard (138 pounds) was sidelined by a shoulder injury.
The entire postseason series was sponsored by the Illinois Wrestling Coaches and Officials Association (IWCOA) rather than by the IHSA.
As a team, the Bulldogs totaled 53 points and finished seventh in the Class 2A standings. The 2A team champion was Woodstock Marian with 178 points. In all, 58 Class 2A schools scored points at state.
Casillas (27-1 season record) posted one-point decisions in both the quarterfinals (3-2 win) and semifinals (4-3 win thanks to a late takedown). He opened state with a pin in 2 minutes and 21 seconds.
Casillas kept his composure while trailing in the semifinals.
“I kept pushing through and trusting my technique,” he said.
In the finals against Hidden, the two grapplers were locked into a 1-1 tie until the final five seconds when the top-ranked Washington wrestler scored a takedown.
“He caught me out of position at the end,” Casillas said. “It wasn’t how I wanted to end, but it was a great season and gives me motivation for the next two years.”
M-S coach Rob Ledin said Casillas did what was necessary for the majority of the match.
“We pushed the pace,” Ledin said, “and for 5 minutes and 45 seconds, there was not one stalling call.”
In little more than the last three months, Casillas participated in and earned varsity letters in three sports: football, baseball and wrestling.
Each had condensed seasons, but Casillas said, “I was happy to get all my seasons in.
“It was really crazy. There was one week where I had practices in all three sports. I did well with what I had.”
Ledin believes there will be a natural progression for Casillas as he concentrates on one sport at a time during the 2021-22 school year.
“We’re looking for a big season next year when we get a full season,” Ledin said.
Renshaw posted his team-leading 21st pin in his final high school match, sticking Woodstock Marian’s Joe Miller in 1 minute and 39 seconds in the fifth-place match.
However, his most memorable win could have occurred hours earlier in the consolation quarterfinals, when he grabbed a 3-2 victory in sudden death.
The victory assured Renshaw of a state medal and, he added, “it was my 100th career win.”
Renshaw took to the mat six times on Friday and registered four wins.
“For the past three or four years, I poured everything I could into the program,” Renshaw said. “It was an amazing end.”
He concluded the year with a 32-5 record and shared the team-lead in wins with 106-pound sophomore Caden Hatton (32-4 final record).
Following Christmas Break, Renshaw was tipping the scales at 250 pounds, but he made weight all season at 220.
“With proper nutrition and more cardio from playing soccer, I easily lost the weight,” Renshaw said.
Next up for the senior is the chance to join the University of Illinois program as a preferred walk-on. That opportunity wasn’t on his radar as a freshman.
“I didn’t have aspirations of college wrestling,” Renshaw said. “I didn’t think I was near that level.”
Even as he moves on, the bio-engineering major will continue to follow the high school program which he served as a team captain for two years.
“My dream was to help others get better,” Renshaw said. “To get seventh at state (as a team) and place three of our qualifiers is amazing.
“I’m super excited about the years coming up.”
He is also excited about his own possibilities for the years ahead.
“I look forward to getting stronger and better,” Renshaw said.
Ledin is optimistic about the future as well. Just three of 14 varsity weight classes this year were filled by seniors.
“Things are looking bright,” Ledin said.
Like Renshaw, Houser wrestled six times at state and posted four wins. Three of his wins at 182 pounds were technical falls by scores of 17-1, 16-0 and 22-7.
“I like to score a lot of points,” said Houser, who concluded the year as the team-leader in takedowns with more than 60.
“He did a lot of nice things on his feet,” Ledin said.
Houser (27-7 season record) bounced back from a loss by pin in the consolation semifinals to win his fifth-place match by major decision 14-4.
“It definitely feels like I was rewarded for all of the hard work I put in,” said Houser, a sophomore.
As a team, the M-S state qualifiers combined for a cumulative 15-13 record for the day. Five Bulldogs won at least two state matches.
“We all fed off the energy of each other,” Houser said.
At 106 pounds, Hatton had a 2-2 record at state. One of his wins was an 18-3 technical fall triumph. He fell one win shy of earning a state medal as did junior teammate Braeden Heinold (152 pounds), who was also 2-2.
Heinold prevailed in two tight matches, collecting 6-5 and 2-1 victories.
“Our kids were well-prepared and in pretty good shape,” Ledin said. “They made us proud.”
Senior Peyton Myers (160 pounds) and sophomore Colton Crowley (285 pounds) lost each of their two state bouts. One of Crowley’s setbacks was by a 1-0 margin.
Due to the lateness of the competitive season – high school wrestling usually ends by the end of February – Ledin won’t plan an intensive summer.
“We’ll do some individual stuff in July and then knock it off until November,” Ledin said. “We don’t want to burn them out.”
For the season, 29 of 32 squad members had at least one varsity match.
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The varsity state meet was the third different tournament that M-S had participants in this week at Springfield.
One Bulldog earned a medal – and IWCOA All-State honors – in the freshmen-sophomore invitational, which was open to wrestlers who had not qualified for the varsity state meet.
Sophomore Camden Harms finished in fifth place at 220 pounds after compiling a 7-2 record at the two-day meet, which ended on Wednesday (June 23).
Harms needed overtime in his first match to garner an 8-6 win over Lincoln Way West’s Anthony Sherman. Among his other wins was a pin in 4 minutes and 43 seconds over Chatham Glenwood’s Jaidyn Lee.
Three other M-S participants ended with 3-2 records at the frosh-soph state meet and were one win away from securing a state medal: sophomores Mason Rasche (106 pounds), Brad Schoonover (160 pounds) and Mikane Didier (285 pounds).
All three of Rasche’s wins were by first-period pins. Schoonover started his state run with three consecutive wins to reach the quarterfinals.
In a meet where schools could enter more than one competitor in a weight class, Didier found himself face-to-face with a teammate in his fourth match, a bout where the loser would be eliminated.
Didier collected a 3-0 victory over sophomore J.J. Weitekamp. Both Didier and Weitekamp recorded a pin at state.
M-S athletes who compiled 2-2 records in the frosh-soph state meet were freshman Gage Decker (126 pounds) and sophomore Theo Ratliff (145 pounds).
Finishing with 1-2 state records were freshman Deandre Hughey (138 pounds), freshman Caleb Hillard (145 pounds) and Weitekamp.
Also participating was freshman Lukas Alstetter (101 pounds), who was 0-2.
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Freshman Isabelle Leyhe became the first M-S female wrestler to earn a state medal and earn All-State honors on Monday (June 21) when she placed eighth in the 113-pound division of the IWCOA girls’ state tournament.
Leyhe compiled a 2-3 record at state. Both of her wins were by pin. Her fastest fall was in 2 minutes and 59 seconds.
In the match for seventh place, Leyhe dropped a 9-6 decision to O’Fallon’s Abby Pilkington. She earlier suffered a 2-0 setback against Quincy Notre Dame’s Catherine Steinkamp in a match that determined which wrestler would advance to the fifth-place bout.
Leyhe finished the season with a 14-19 overall record. During the regular season, the majority of her matches were against boys.
