With the USA folkstyle nationals such a preminer event being held so close to us Why are we not doing anything in this state to help promote the Ne kids to attend.We are trying to build the state tourney into a top notch tourney Why not have a added bonus for the kids maybe like half entry paid for Champions or something.Just hard to understand why hardly any of are state reps or kids dont attend.This tourney is a top notch well run very organized event maybe could learn a few ideas from this to make the Ne usa state tourney better as it has been improving every year.

There were 2 USA directors at this event. There were some other USA directors at another USA sanctioned event going on the same day.

There are 4 weekends in a row in which USA directors are going some place working or coaching... USA State, Middle School Duals/Huskerland, USA Nationals/Midwest Classic Nationals and Elementary National duals.

To say that we are doing nothing is just not so. We are promoting USA wrestling in this State. We promote what USA wrestling has to offer and how it help kids get to the next level of wrestling. We don't do this by jumping past a step. We are working to improve Districts and State. We still aren't at the numbers we could possibly be at. Have we done better each year? Yes, but we have a ways to go yet. We will continue to market USA wrestling and put most of our efforts in getting our districts and State were it needs to be. The rest will take care of itself. I agree that State should be a qualifier for Nationals but we haven't been ready to make that a requirement up to this point. Yes it's time to revisit the idea.

People will continue to make tough choices as long as there are 4 or 5 big tournaments in a row....4 or 5 weeks straight. Three of the 4 weekends is right in Nebraska so it's not a surprise what they choose.

This time of year there are quite a few tournaments going on every weekend. Also, if you have baseball, softball along with track and field competing for an athletes time you aren't going to see great turnouts from time to time.
We have been to a couple of tournaments this year where if the spring sports weren't in full swing the competition would have been brutal. But more than a few of those athletes had baseball games on the competing weekends so the quality along with the numbers suffered as a result.

As far as the tournament was concerned the numbers were up as was the quality. It's just Nebraska's participation is low. Other state's have the same spring sports as we do and they had good turnouts.

Matcat the difference is (I'm not 100% sure) is that in nebraska you are not suppose to compete in any other event if you are in a sports season. If i recall that is why when we had the border brawl with Iowa we could not put together our best team because kids who were in baseball or track could not participate and still be eligible for their spring sport.

I'm talking all age levels not just highschool.

The situation isn't that there's other sports going on. Although it may play a small roll.

I'm sure there are far more NE kids going to Liberty Nationals than went to USA Nationals in Cedar Falls. Why? Very simple. Liberty Nationals did not have a major tournament, right in Nebraska competing with it. In the last several years Huskerland has been on the same weekend as USA Nationals. This year it was the Midwest Classic Nationals that was on that weekend. Most people will pick and choose one or the other. Sure USA Nationals is tougher than Midwest Classic Nationals but for 85 percent of the kids Midwest Classic was tough enough for the level of wrestling they are currently at. So most chose Midwest Classic Nationals. It also doesn't help that there are big tournaments going on weeks before leading up to USA Nationals and even a couple weeks after it. They lost a few kids for that reason to. Yes, there are die hards out there that went to both but not every kid in Nebraska is ready for that kind of a weekend. We will continue to have low to average numbers as long as we have March and April madness in Nebraska.

You hit on one thing 525, the level of the competition and the only way they're going to get to that level is buy wrestling in these types of tournaments.

I agree Albert...if we could get more of the upper level kids that are ready to try their hand at the next level, then that's what we should be shooting for. There really isn't any reason why we can't get 35 or 40 kids there each year. The kids that are making the national dual teams should be going because it's the same kids they will be facing again someday.

Plus, by attending Midwest Classic you are supporting the UNK wrestling program. Hopefully that helps them keep a program. We do not want to take opportunities away from our kids by losing another college program in our state.

I would agree that wrestling in the national level tournaments is beneficial but not essential. The Bresters are a good example of this. I think it has been proven that national experience does not necessarily lead to state titles.

It's been proven that state titles mean nothing after highschool, they're nice to have but not needed to wrestle at the next level and win national titles.

For whatever it's worth, my opinion is that if we had more FS/GR immediately following Folkstyle that there would be greater numbers as a whole. The folkstyle tournaments have become popular and make big money and aren't going to go away more than likely. Use to be that after the 1st of March, clubs that were big into FS/GR stopped practicing folkstyle entirely and only attended the olympic's style tournaments. The lapse kills the numbers and overlaps into other sports even more, making it hard to even have a workout partner. If the FS/GR season could be fit more into the March/mid April time frame for local and state w/regionals close behind, it would be more accomodating to an increase in #'s(IMO). Fargo is so distant that it's basically the 'next season' anyway.

quote:

Originally posted by BLASCHKO:
I would agree that wrestling in the national level tournaments is beneficial but not essential. The Bresters are a good example of this. I think it has been proven that national experience does not necessarily lead to state titles.

I coached Craig Brester at Fargo once. I remember thinking, "man this kid has some potential." I guess that was an understatement. I believe Cory was on some of the Disney Dual teams. So the Bresters did have some national experience.

Unless the athlete is a one sport athlete, in this case wrestling, they are involved in the other sports pretty heavily right now.

quote:

Originally posted by BLASCHKO:
I would agree that wrestling in the national level tournaments is beneficial but not essential. The Bresters are a good example of this. I think it has been proven that national experience does not necessarily lead to state titles.

Lifting, running, training hard in a practice room, eating all the right foods and going to camps doesn't necessarily lead to state titles either but for most, they wouldn't have won it without them. Seeking better and better competition to elevate yourself to another level in competition. National competition will help them do that. It's not for all kids just the ones ready to be challenged by it. If they are beating most of the kids each weekend in the State then it's time to look elsewhere.