Depth key as season begins Thursday for CCS wrestling

    With 25 athletes reporting for this year’s Chase County wrestling season, Head Coach Matt Vlasin said his team should have decent depths at most weights.
    Returning letterwinners are seniors Arturo Miscles, Cayden White, Cody Duffy and Brice Vitosh, plus sophomores Jaret Peterson and Cooper Dillan. Junior letterwinner Dawson Mollendor will miss the season with an injury.
    Peterson and White qualified for state wrestling last season.
    The large group of returning wrestlers has made practice run quickly and smoothly, Vlasin said.
    Vlasin said Vitosh has really stepped up as a senior leader, adding that they also have a great group of young leaders
    The Longhorns’ season starts off with a bang this week. The team will head to the Garden County Invite Thursday, the Hi-Line Invite in Elwood Friday and at Broken Bow Saturday.
    “I never feel like there is enough time to get ready for our first competition but hopefully our experience helps us out,” Vlasin said.
    Nebraska schools could choose whether or not to field a girls’ team this year. Keirsten Colton and Aurora Griebel have wrestled for the past two years and choose to compete as a girls’ team rather than compete against boys.
    Both are battling injuries, unfortunately, and Vlasin is unsure if and when the pair will be healthy.
    The only separate girls’ meet on the Longhorns’ schedule is at Hemingford Thursday.  Vlasin said most of the meets on Chase County’s schedule will have a girls’ division.
    This year’s District C-4 meet will be in O’Neill Feb. 11-12. Joining CCS there will be Amherst, Arcadia/Loup City, Centura, Gibbon, Gordon-Rushville, Hershey, Kearney Catholic, Loomis/Bertrand, Mitchell, O’Neill, Ord, Red Cloud/Blue Hill, Valentine, West Holt and Wood River.
    The state meet will be held at the CHI Health Center Arena in Omaha. After a four-day meet last year, this year’s meet will be Feb. 17-19.
    Class C boys will wrestle in the morning sessions Thursday and Friday. Friday’s evening session and Saturday will feature all classes.
    All girls will wrestle in the same division, starting Friday afternoon and running into Saturday.