Coaches Corner for February 16th: Josh Atwell, Boone Girls Wrestling

With us on Coach's Corner here in KWBG, you're going to talk Boone Girls Wrestling with Josh Atwell as the Toreadors had a chance to compete, obviously at the state meet and was fun talking to the girls beforehand and talking to coach beforehand.

And Josh, now you've had a chance to kind of sit back and take a breath a little bit. Cause I know that's kind of a world when a couple of days down in Iowa city, down at Coralville, tell me about the experience down there.

And what'd you think now kind of looking back and reflecting? Oh, it was, it was a lot of fun, you know, it's, it's a high stress for me and there's a lot of logistics.

And you know, there's that emotional roller coaster for the girls, emotional roller coaster for me, you know, all the coaches, but it was a lot of fun.

You know, anytime you get to take multiple girls to, to, to the state tournament and watch them compete and watch them go after their goals and their, and their, and their dreams. That's always a very fulfilling, very fun time.

Well, let's start with Emerson Zener at one 35 coach and loses by a tech fall on her first round match comes back though with, with a pin in round number two, before bowing out in the tournament with a pin in round number three in the constellation. Tell me about Emerson.

What'd you see from her down in Coralville and just give me some thoughts on her tournament. You know, I thought it's great to get that experience, you know, and it's great to go. Get that win there. She now gets it. You know, I always do the same thing every year.

I take my girl brand new girls out in the middle of it and they all just say the same thing. They're like, Oh, well, it's not that big from down here. And then we just talked about how the scoring's the same.

The math size is the same, you know, it's just a different place, you know, and, and, um, you know, she did great. It's great to get that experience. You know, this is only her second year of wrestling.

So to make that state tournament, to win that regional tournament was a huge accomplishment. Hopefully she's not satisfied. Next year she comes back hungry and wants to get on that medal stand. Um, but you know, it was a lot of fun to see her rise to the occasion.

And you know, that first match, yeah, we might've lost by tech fall, but I think we gave up 14 points before we started wrestling.

You know, she wrestled another girl that's kind of wild and sometimes Emerson, um, when you get some of those matches, you know, we step over the wrong, we load ourselves up or we do things like that. And, and that's okay.

That, that comes with that just only being two years into your wrestling journey. So, you know, it was a lot of fun to watch her, um, build her teammates up after she was out.

And you know, she, she definitely has a future in, uh, Braden hair because she did all the girl's hair for each round. After that, I met for all that. So that was, uh, you know, she contributed in her own way on helping those girls out as much as possible.

Let's talk about Poppy Malone, then next at 105 and loses, uh, by a pin in her opening round match. And then boy, did she get hot.

She got a, uh, pin in the consolation round one in two 54 gets a pin in consolation round number two and one 15 gets another pin in the consolation round number three and three 24.

Uh, get stuck in at the consolation semi-finals in 51 seconds and then, uh, ends up getting six by, uh, falling in her fifth place match.

But boy, I tell you what Poppy showed, uh, what, what I think she can do when things are working right, man, that was a heck of a little run she went on. Yeah. Yeah.

And down there, it's all who gets hot, you know, at whatever time, all you, you know, you just got to put a string of matches together and Poppy, you know, she, she recovered from that first one. You know, I think that was, that's a very competitive match.

Her and that girl have gone back and forth. Um, that girl's got the upper hand right now, but you know, that happens sometimes. Sometimes you get, they figure you out and you got to make adjustments. Um, but yeah, she went on a heck of a little run.

She definitely wanted to get there. You know, I remember after her consolation quarters, I think it was round three, she comes back and goes, oh, I'm going to finish higher on the stand, you know? And I'm like, yup. Now let's see how high and all this other stuff.

And it, you know, she's still wrestled tough. She was just beat up, you know, worn out, you know, it, it's just a long season. Those are tough matches, multiple day tournaments are a grind, you know, and, and every girl there speed up.

But, you know, we were beat up to, we tweaked the shoulder. We're trying to fight through mentally and physically. And, you know, she gave a great effort. We just didn't get the W in all the matches.

And so she should still be really proud of her effort because that's tough down there. It's tough to do it. She did, especially after that first round, you know, that was a, that was new territory for her down there.

So we made some gains and it was really cool to see her rise to that occasion.

Well, then we got to talk about our grizzled veteran, as I joke with, with Cadence Hagen about this at a one 90 and she comes in round number one, gets a major decision, victory nine to one loses by a pin in the quarterfinals. And then she kind of ran back, forth, back, forth.

She, she loses in the consolation round number two by a pin, comes back in round number three as well. And then it's like, okay, Cadence, what, what, what do you got coming back?

You know, what, what's, you know, what's coming with you and just loses a rough match in that seventh eighth place match. But she has been such a, gosh, she's been just a rock for you guys the last four years.

Josh, that, that I know that was probably a lot of emotion that went into not just that tournament, but that last match for sure. Oh yeah, for sure.

You know, I, I could meet me and Cadence had several talks through year and about how fast it's gone and how cool it's been and all these things. And, and, you know, it's, I could tell the, the, you can see that incoming, you know, and she could feel it. I could feel it.

And, you know, it was, she, she did a great job down there. That's a tough bracket. You know, um, the returning state champ went one and two, you know, in that bracket.

And that's the deal on, on paper, she might've been picked to win some of those matches, you know, just like on her first match on paper, she wasn't supposed to win it. And you just never know what can happen. And Cadence was in all of those matches.

We just got caught in some bad scrambles and some positions and, and, you know, and those girls capitalized and same thing with Poppy. The effort was there.

The result just didn't always come out the way we hoped for, but it was still a cool journey to see her make it back to the stand and in her, in her career down there. Um, you know, cause it's tough. It's just tough.

And it was, you know, I gave her a great big hug there at the end, you know, she's throughout her career. She doesn't like, I don't get a hug. I don't get a hug. And I'm like, girl, you don't understand the hug that's coming.

So, and, and we had a big long hug and I just told her how proud of her I was and how, you know, how special of a career she really had, you know, she's our first girl over a hundred wins first finalist, you know, her and Poppy are multi-time place winners, multi-time state qualifiers, you know, and the list goes, you know, she's going to be a multi-time scholar, all American, all state.

Like her, her, her list of accomplishments are, are long. Let's just put it that way, which is what you want out of your career. You know, give it everything you have and get, get, you know, and you can live with the results.

Well, and I think one thing that, that all three of these girls want, and one of them obviously has her career done and the other two will eventually, but there's, Caden set that bar pretty high, Josh.

I mean, there's going to be some girls coming up when it comes to Boone wrestling that that look at that and go, what was Caden's like? What was she like as a wrestler? I mean, she, she's, whether she likes it or not, she's going to be somebody that people aspire to be like. Yep.

Yep. And that's, that's the deal. Like that's, that's what I tell her. You know, you're that first one to break through those, those walls.

The first one through always gets a little bloody, you know, but now you've given, you've shown all these girls here in, in the, in the Boone area that this is. What can happen if you give great effort and you just show up every day, work hard and just keep trying to get better.

So, you know, we've talked to me and her have talked about that as well, about how, listen, you, you've blazed the trail. Now let's see who follows it. And, you know, and it's, it's been a real cool experience having her show that.

And, and as a coach, I couldn't be happier for her and, and everything she's done. Josh, as always, thank you so much for some time. We'll season wrap with you here in a couple of weeks. Congrats on a great state tournament. Well, thank you very much.

Josh Atwell again, joining us. Boone girls wrestling here on coaches corner.