The kid that I had that wrestled both of them was Tyra Thomilin while I was at Schlagle. When Tyra was a sophomore he wrestled Lopez and was ahead of him in the third period 2-0 and got caught in a backside cradle and got beat. Tyra wrestled Justin the next year over in 5A (we fluxed back and forth about every other year) in the semi finals of state and got hammered. When Justin nailed Tyra, tyra was 24-0 and ranked second in the state. We had no questions about Ware after that day. Lopez had a funny style and I think it sort of artificially made it look like he was closer to Ware than he should have been. He was tough, no doubt but not nearly as athletic as Ware.

By the way Ware went to Nebraska and took second in the Big Eight as a freshman and lost to a national champion in the finals 7-5 after leading most of the match. He was ranked fifth inthe nation as a freshman but was upset at the NCAA's. He didn't like college and left after that but he was great while he was there. Hankins was tough as a boot. He was very dominant both his senior and junior years.

By the way I don't remember Harrington but that could have been when we were in 5A or after I left.

Matthew C- I never wrestled Morrow or Harrington. Others I did wrestle who I thought were good were Shawn Simons (leoti), Rick Burris(Emporia), Danny and Shawn Copeland (Salina Cen) Donnie Modene (Salina South). I never had to wrestle Todd Layton but watched him thump some teammates of mine enough to know he should be on you list. He was tough. I wrestle his teammate Shane Wallis who was pretty good. Treaster should be on your list as well.

Westfahl/Mamasawn. What would you call the dominating team? Example, Kapaun 85 or Beloit in the early 80's.Goodland or Kapaaun during the Grand State years. etc. Who would you rank to be the toughest teams stacked through the years. Tough decision I think. I gues the ultimate all star teams. Ranking 1-10 any year. Matthew.

The best team I have seen was the Ark City team that had the Hernandez brothers, Ware as a soph, Scott Goodale and several others whose names I cant think of, I think a Beeson. That was the most dominant team I have ever seen in this state I think they won a very good 5A by a hundred points or more that year. Hoxie had a team in the early 70's and Norton had one in the late sixties that had five or six state champs a peice. Those were easily the most dominant high school teams I have seen. The Kapaun teams were great but why wouldnt they be, they recruited them all over the Wichita area. I sort of thought of them as a Wichita All-Star team. The Beloit teams were very good and there were some others that I know I am leaving out but those are the ones that stick out in my mind. There was a St. Francis team in the sixties that had some Kellers, Cooks, and others on it that was awfully good. Pudge Wilson had some really amazing teams out there and won the state six times in a row with them.

One name I have seen left off these lists is Scott Murray - he wrestled at Washburn Rural in Topeka from 1989 to 1992 (I believe has was as fat as 125 pounds his senior year). He took 3rd as a freshman and junior, and won state as a sophomore and senior. I'm not sure about the details (I'll have to look it up on the back of the Team Kansas T-shirts...), but I know he was an All-American a couple of times up in Fargo at Junior Nationals.

After high school, he went on to the University of Northern Iowa (the same school Nate Lawrenz attended). As a freshman he qualified for the NCAAs, but didn't make weight. He also came within one match of being an NCAA All-American as a junior. His senior year he was 1-2 (I think) at the NCAAs. Not too shabby, even though he never won a medal at nationals.

I went to the same high school as Scott and had the opportunity to watch him wrestle several times. He worked with the freestyle time in Topeka often and I learned quite a bit from him. He's probably the most talented wrestler I've ever met personally, and I've got quite a bit of respect for the guy.

Probably the best in the early 80's was David Ray. Wrestled for Goddard and Bishop Carroll. 3x state champ and 2 time Greco national champ, freestyle runner-up. Wrestled at Iowa for 3 years behind Randy Lewis, transfered to Edinboro and ended up 3rd in NCAA senior year. He would have to be top 5 in Kansas History.

Todd Drake is mine. Four timer. One loss. Third in Nationals a couple of times DII. National Champion once. Not too shabby. Ware would have been a national champion two times or more. Had the talent walked through 4A through 6A competition.
Do think that wrestlers dominated more then than now? Example, How would Hoover hang with Ware, Canfield, Devoe, Drake, Akin, Jones, Duell, (the schlagle kid that beat whole heartidly Akin) etc. Do you think talent is better today along with work ethic, or stronger in the seventies, sixties or even the eighties??????? Tough one to call.

Westfahl. What is your Complete all-star lineup? 98-heavy. If you could use any year.

Best team- Probably 84 Beloit with 6 champs with the Treaster and Johnson Brothers. Although I saw Ark City scored 203 points in 92. They had to be good.
I think 85 Kapaun was up there. I think they had 6 in the finals and eight in the top 4. I have to say Wichita West with 6 finalists last year and Carrol this year with 10 medals and 4 champs was pretty impressive.

Someone to consider, and I may be a tad bias, is Tony Dong from Concordia. He ended his career at Con with a 54-1 record. In the 9th grade he weighed 80 lbs. and couldn't make the 85 lb. minimum. In the 10th grade he weighed a whopping 90 lbs. but still couldn't make the team. He lost in the state finals his jr. year and had an undefeated sr. year. He then went to Southwest Missouri State and qualified for the NCAA's and went 2-2 his jr. year. His senior year was one to remember and forget. Ranked as high as 5th in the nation he was a runner-up to Boling at the Midlands. Boling was probably three or four years older. He had a great chance at placing at the NCAA's, but didn't make weight for the regional. So, a person can't always tell by his high school career how good of a college wrestler he might be.

Tood Layton from Indy was a four timer who could have went almost anywhere in college but chose to wrestle at Notre Dame and earn a degree that is now making him a lot of money. He is a credit to wrestling, someone who sees the big picture. Also I would put him up with any of the great Kansas wrestlers of all time.

I love to read this stuff, brings back memories.
I got to see Layton one time, he was a very
intimidating wrestler. Saw Ware, his senior year
at regionals and state, awesome. One that maybe
overlooked on here Temoer Terry, hurt most of his
senior year, dominated Bahm in the finals. Bahm
had dominated everyone else that year. Best team
I've seen Ark City, any one in the early 90's.
Ware, Hernandes', Bahm's, Goodale, Hankins.
Although I never thought that Devin Bahm,or Hankins were DOMINATING, they always found a way
to win. I thought Hankins had a "bad" match in
the finals his senior year, but still pulled it
out, truly a champion. Probably his toughfest
matches were in Kids where he had to wrestle
B.J. Moorman from Coffeyville, he never wrestled
in high school because he was home schooled. He
wrestled Kids all the way through, and always
gave Hankins trouble, many one point matches between the two.

Hummm my complete team. I will try although the weights have changed for some of these guys over the years.

98 or 95 then - Fisher - Norton
112 - Lampe - Colby
119 - Duell - Goodland
125 or 127 - Maynes - Salina South
130 - Roberson - BV Northwest
135 - Canfield-Drake-all of those guys.
140 - Ware - Ark City
145 - Falkender - St. Francis
152 - Ginger - St. Francis
160 - Hernandez - Ark City
171 - The Tacha brothers of Norton as a tag team match which would be interesting and entertaining.
189 - Rock Westfahl - Kinsley
215 - Chaney - Wyandotte
HWT - Lonnie Austin - Kinsley and the Norton kid whos name escapes me but was mentioned a lot earlier.

gosh that is tough and I just couldn't remember a few of those weights and where some of them landed. I may have gotten a couple of them out of their weight classes but as Moore reminds me I am getting old. I know I missed some of them and I put the Tacha's on there because they still scare the hell out of me (laugh)

As for do I think kids are better now than in yester-year. No I don't at all. Kids are much sloppier now and they are forced to be because of some of the rules that have been imposed on them. It is impossible to say that kids have changed or not over the years. Everyone likes to say their era is the best but if you look at how short a time that has been in the scheme of things the human animal just doesnt change that much. I will tell you one thing it is much harder to get kids to work hard now but on the other hand they have so much opportunity to wrestle so many more matches they should be better. I think sometimes we try to make wrestling appealing to the masses at the expense of good wrestling. People who know me know I was a leg coach and the rules makers have really tried to end that form of wrestling. Good setups are a thing of the past because the refs will call you for stalling before you can get a quality move set up. That is why, in my mind you see so many kids make desperate and very sloppy moves that cost them matches. Very crowd pleasing but crappy wrestling. I think kids are kids some are more talented than others but it is not the same game for better or worse and maybe both that it was twenty five or thirty years ago. Personally I think it was more of an art then than it is now and I miss that very much.

Ubben does not even compare to Boyle. He is in nowhere near the same league. Boyle was a solid block of finely-tuned muscle. He would have pinned Ubben in the first period just like he did to every opponent he faced his senior year. There is no question as to the best HWT during this time period.

After thinking about my list for a few hours, I probably left off Eric Akin who should be there along side of Roberson or Maynes and Roy Oeser who should be there at 152 with Ginger of Sainty. Really backstroking now ain't I (smile).

Boyle is by far the best HWT. I agree he would have pinned Ubben just like everyone else his Junior and Senior year with the exception of his finals match his Junior year.

how about David Seamonds at 189lbs?

Great list Westfahl! I would have to disagree with Falkender over Layton. Lampe would have lost to Jones of Kapaun by at least four points.
Picking this list is like eating a mud sandwhich. Not very much fun. Amazing how many old timers are listed compared to the current crew.
What about Little from the old Douglass days? Wrestled for K-State. Tough as some of the rest.
Hernandez would have had to break Underwoods fingers to get that spot in the line-up.
What a wonderful game this has become. Amazing only a few of us try to put forth the perfect team.