Gaylord Rules North, Seeks to Take State
December 6, 2018
By Chris Dobrowolski
Special for Second Half
GAYLORD — The town of Gaylord is surrounded on all sides by more than an hour of northern Michigan roads and landscape.
But when it comes to high school wrestling, Gaylord is like an island.
Few wrestling programs in the northern Lower Peninsula are on par with the Blue Devils, who have made team success an annual occurrence and churned out elite individual performers year after year.
“Everyone who wrestles us, they know they’re going to get a battle,” said Gaylord head coach Jerry Lajoie, who is entering his 24th season leading the Blue Devils. “We’ve been to the state tournament several times — three or four times in the semis, a couple more times in the quarters and one time in the finals. Last year we put out two state champs and three other medalists. Not bad out of 14 weight classes for us.”
As good of a run as Gaylord has had in wrestling — the Blue Devils are working on a string of consecutive Big North Conference and District championships that goes back more than a decade and have won Regional titles in three of the last four years — last year was the program’s best. As a team, the Blue Devils advanced to the Division 2 championship match for the first time and had Chayse Lajoie and Derek Giallombardo reach the pinnacle of the Individual Finals at Ford Field, winning championships at 112 and 125 pounds, respectively. Gaylord had five others qualify for the Individual Finals, with Joe Markham third at the 285-pound class, Jacob McKnight fourth at 140 and Cade Foster sixth at 171.
“It was a great environment to be in,” said John Sosa, who was among Gaylord’s seven individual state qualifiers in 2018 and a Finals placer as a freshman in 2017. “Everybody wanted to be there. Everyone put in 110 percent, and it showed at the end of the year when we were in the state finals match. Everyone was willing to work. I could pick anyone in the room and everyone would give 110 percent, which I very much appreciate.”
The Blue Devils are motivated by last season’s 43-17 loss to five-time reigning Division 2 champion Lowell in the Final and are hoping to replicate their trip this winter, with perhaps a different result in the last match.
“We’ve got a team that I think we can get back to team states with,” said Jerry Lajoie. “We’re going to be focusing on winning conference, then Districts and Regionals. Once you get (to the Finals), you never know what can happen.”
The challenge will be replacing seniors like Giallombardo, Markham and 160-pound individual qualifier Nick Brewster. This year, more than half of the 33 grapplers on the roster are freshmen. That prevalence of youth doesn’t faze a veteran coach like LaJoie.
“We just had this discussion when we had a meeting on Wednesday — we’re starting a lot of young kids,” he said. “I said, ‘I don’t care if you’re a freshman or not. Expectations are the same. We’ve had freshman state champions. Why not you?’”
The Blue Devils are fortunate to be able to lean on veteran leadership while they get their younger group ready to compete at a high level. Foster is back as a senior to handle the 171 or 189-pound division, and the junior class led by Chayse Lajoie, who can wrestle anywhere from 119 to 130, Sosa (125 or 130) and McKnight (152 or 160) is strong and figures to rack up a lot of wins over the next few months.
“I’m just hoping our team can push through and make it to states again, and hopefully contest for the state championship again,” said Chayse Lajoie, the most accomplished member of the squad as a two-time MHSAA individual champion as well as a Junior Greco-Roman national champ at 120 pounds. “We’re just trying to get everyone together right now. Towards the end of the season we’ll start focusing on that. We kind of take things step by step.”
Hard work is the most common response the Blue Devils give when asked what it takes to become an exceptional wrestler, and that helps explain Gaylord’s success – there’s no shortage of work ethic in Gaylord’s wrestling room. Lajoie demands that and dedication, though he also makes sure wrestling is fun for his team, too. With all of those factors in the equation, he doesn’t have much trouble getting his squad to meet the expectations of the program.
“Kids are probably the best judge of character out of anybody. More so than adults,” said Lajoie. “They figure out if you care about them or not. And if you do, they’ll buy in.”
It doesn’t take Gaylord’s wrestlers long to realize their coach is willing to put in just as much time as they do, creating a mutual respect that strengthens the bond between coach and athletes.
“He’s a great guy,” Sosa said of Lajoie. “Very appreciative that we can give him our time. He says, ‘If you give me your time, I’ll give you mine.’ Very knowledgeable on and off the mat. You can call on him any time of the day, and he’ll help you out.”
The end result is what has become a wrestling dynasty in northern Michigan, built from the youth level up with a group of kids who take pride in being from Gaylord and everything for which the wrestling program stands.
“We only have so many kids to choose from, and no one in our area,” said Jerry Lajoie. “You can’t move five minutes and go to a different school. That’s where our badge of honor is. We’re up here, we’re all local boys — let’s go battle.”
Chris Dobrowolski has covered northern Lower Peninsula sports since 1999 at the Ogemaw County Herald, Alpena News, Traverse City Record-Eagle and currently as sports editor at the Antrim Kalkaska Review since 2016. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Manistee, Wexford, Missaukee, Roscommon, Ogemaw, Iosco, Alcona, Oscoda, Crawford, Kalkaska, Grand Traverse, Benzie, Leelanau, Antrim, Otsego, Montmorency, Alpena, Presque Isle, Cheboygan, Charlevoix and Emmet counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Gaylord’s Cade Foster works toward a pin during last season’s Division 2 Semifinal win over Warren Woods Tower at Wings Stadium. (Middle) The Blue Devils, including coach Jerry Lajoie (left), cheer on a teammate. (Click to see more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)
Repeat Reaffirms Clinton's Spot Among Annual Contenders
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
March 30, 2021
KALAMAZOO – The Clinton wrestling program took its place at the top of Division 4 a year ago, claiming the first Finals title in school history.
On Tuesday, it emphatically announced that it’s here to stay.
Clinton rolled through its competition throughout the day, topped off with a 55-9 win against New Lothrop at Wings Event Center, to claim its second-straight Division 4 title.
“I think now people know that we’re the real deal,” Clinton co-coach Jeff Rolland said. “We solidified what we did last year. We’ve got a lot of young kids – there's only four guys in our lineup every day that aren’t going to be here next year. We did this without three all-staters in our lineup from last year. We have a lot of depth. We have more coming. I think people know that we’re for real now. It’s not a one-year deal or whatever.”
Clinton was dominant throughout the postseason, and closed it out the same way, winning 76-6 in the Quarterfinal against Ravenna and 59-9 in the Semifinal against Leslie. That’s despite what Rolland said was a performance in the Semifinal that was less than the team’s best. But Clinton has reached the point where it can win even when it’s not at the top of its game.
“Since my freshman year we were chasing it and we fell short, then we fell short again my sophomore year,” senior Landis Gillman said. “My junior year we really picked it up, and we got into the mindset that we wanted it. We became a family. We’ve just been striving and pushing ourselves to the limits to reach this point.”
And in case there was any doubt remaining about the program’s status, Clinton has won its titles against the two programs that had dominated the division for more than a decade prior – Hudson (2020) and New Lothrop.
“Last year was big because we had to go through both,” Rolland said. “New Lothrop, if they’re not the most storied program in the state, I don’t know who is. We’ve got nothing but respect for that team, those guys. It makes it special when you beat a team like that, for sure.”
It was Gillman who started Clinton off with a bang in the Finals, as he bumped up to 140 pounds and won by major decision against New Lothrop’s Andrew Krupp in a matchup of wrestlers ranked in the top three.
Clinton won the first six matches of the dual, five by major decision – by Gillman, Kent McCombs (145), AJ Baxter (152), Spencer Konz (160) and Logan Badge (189) – and one with a first-period pin from Brayden Randolph (171).
“Landis had a day today,” Rolland said. “He went through some kids today. That was big. He’s up a weight class. He’s very, very good as you saw. But a major starting out, I think our kids fed off that. I’m so proud of that kid. He’s a senior, he spent two years on the bench, waited his turn, and now he’s got his shot.”
New Lothrop picked up its two wins in the dual at 215 and 285, as Grayson Orr won a 4-3 decision, followed by a second-period fall from Isiah Pasik.
Clinton closed the dual out with six straight wins, however, as Connor Younts (103) and Ethan Younts (135) each won by pin, Nik Shadley (125) won by technical fall, and Coy Perry (112) and Zak Shadley (130) won by decision. Connor Busz (119) won by forfeit.
“We did what we needed to do; we wrestled those kids hard,” New Lothrop coach Jeff Campbell said. “They sent a kid out at every weight that was a very talented wrestler, a very experienced wrestler who was well-coached, and we had to compete hard against them, and every single kid did. We just didn’t have as much ammunition as they did today. But I was really, really proud of our effort. We made plenty of mistakes, but we definitely made every point get earned, and that’s all we can try to do.”
The championship match appearance was the first since 2018 for the Hornets, who had made five straight starting in 2014 and have won 15 team titles.
“It’s an expectation – from the youth level up, we try to put ourselves in a position to do well,” Campbell said. “I think it’s great for our younger guys, and those younger guys that got to step onto the mat. It’s another one of those years when we lose a good crop of seniors. I told them out here, ‘You seniors, your legacy isn’t whether or not you win or lose this last match or you win or lose a state title yourself. It’s what did you teach the kids along the way? Even when you didn’t know they were watching, what were you doing? How hard were you working? Were you cutting weight the right way? Did you compete in these matches when you were the underdog fearless and wrestle hard?’ They showed that today.”
New Lothrop defeated Bark River-Harris 54-20 in the Quarterfinal, and received a bye in the Semifinal, as both Hudson and Schoolcraft were disqualified for putting in a wrestler at an ineligible weight in their Quarterfinal.
Gillman, McCombs, Baxter, Randolph, Badge, Connor Younts, Perry, Busz and Zak Shadley each picked up three wins on the day for Clinton.
PHOTOS: (Top) Clinton’s Landis Gillman wrestles New Lothrop’s Andrew Krupp during Tuesday’s Division 4 Final. (Middle) Clinton celebrates its repeat championship. (Click for more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)