Sometimes you have to lose big to win big. The South Tama Trojans couldn’t find that statement any truer. A year ago at this time the Trojans left their 2015 district tournament in Solon heartbroken after each wrestler fell short of advancing to the State Tournament. After the sting of disappointment faded, the Trojans knew they did not want a repeat performance in 2016. And this year the Trojans did not disappoint! When the day was done South Tama advanced six of their nine district qualifiers to the The Well for the State tournament. It will be the first trip for each of the six STC wrestlers (four sophomores and two seniors).

“It feels a lot better than it did a year ago,” said coach Nate Van Dyke, “I don’t know if (last year) was a wakeup call for us but I think (the difference) was a little bit of maturity and we just put things together the last couple of weeks. We’ve been kind of banged up all year and we got some of our leaders back in the lineup.”

The Trojans day started with Brady Fritz at 113. Fritz was the first to make it through to State pinning both of his opponents Jackson Hamlin (Clear Lake) and Ian Showers (BCLUW-SH).

7th ranked Tanner Probasco got his day rolling with a pin in the first period over Brody Roll of Osage. He went on to go three periods with fifth ranked Nate Lasher (Charles City) and earned a 7-0 decision win that punched his ticket to Des Moines.

At 132 Colton Vest earned his first trip to State with pins over Will Kirschbaum (Clear Lake) and Dillon Rubow (Iowa Falls-Alden).

Next up for the Trojans was senior Jaret Probasco. Probasco faced second ranked Max Forsyth (Charles City) in his first match of the day. Forsyth got the pin over Probasco. Probasco then faced Jake Simon (Grinnell). The two who are longtime friends off of the mats had faced each other the week before at sectionals where Simon came out the victor. But with State on the line Probasco stuck Simon to advance into the second place wrestle-back match. Probasco’s final match of the day was with Derek Fox of Osage. With fans, friends, and teammates holding a collective breathe, Probasco pinned Fox to advance to the State tournament.

At 152 South Tama’s Isaac Judge had arguably the toughest field of competition for the day. Judge who is ranked fifth started his day by facing third ranked Brock Jennings (Osage). Judge, who appeared to be very focused on the task at hand, defeated Jennings 8-2. His next match was with ninth ranked Ryan Faught (Clear Lake). Keeping fans on the edges of their seats, the match went into overtime. Judge scored a last second takedown that cemented his spot on the state bracket.

South Tama’s final wrestler to advance was Bailey Chyma at 170. Chyma defeated Justin Woods (Osage) by major decision in his first match. It was a bit of a slow start for the senior grappler. At one point during the match he turned to his Dad, Steve, who is also a volunteer coach shaking his head.

“I just wanted the day to be over with,” said Chyma.

He then faced 9th ranked Michael Kent of Iowa Falls-Alden. Both wrestlers seemed hesitant to make any moves, which sent their match into overtime. Chyma came out of the bout the victor earning his first trip to State.

While each of the six have made major strides in their high school careers they are adamant that getting to State is simply not enough.

“It’s what we’ve been working towards all year,” said Chyma.

“I want to bring home some hardware,” said senior Jaret Probasco.

The 2015-16 team has had to overcome several obstacles to get where they are at. Injuries threatened to take out more than one of the members but at the end of the day the goal of the state tournament is a huge driving force.

“(Timing) is huge. We always take about taking losses before Christmas and even after Christmas coming up even through the conference tournament we talk about those being preseason notches. Everybody starts out 0-0 really at sectionals and districts.”

As far as goals moving forward Van Dyke stated, “I’ll have to think about it a little bit. I know there are state place winners in there and state title caliber guys in there but we will kind of look at where we are at and go from there.”

The state tournament begins on Thursday February 18. Class 2A will wrestle starting at 6 p.m. at Wells Fargo Arena.