I attended the KSU wrestling club's NCWA regional competition yesterday in Manhattan.

I was very impressed with the program that Coach Beau Tillman and the KSU Wrestling Booster Club have established in Manhattan. I talked with Beau yesterday. He is very committed to building a team at Manhattan that can win the National club title. His team practices five to six days a week and competes in open tournaments that NCAA teams compete in during the season.

I think KSU would be an excellent option for a high school senior who wants to continue his wrestling career at a high level of competition in the state of Kansas.

KSU had a good day on Saturday at their Southwest Conference Championship finishing second overall to Newman. You can view the results at the below site.

http://www.k-state.edu/wrestling/results/swconf.htm

Congratulations to the KSU Wrestling Club on their fine showing saturday. An extra shout out to two former NCKL wrestlers, Brendan Lund of Clay Center who finished first and Jordan Beckman of Marysville who finished second. Great job!

There is a picture of the team and coaches after the tournament right now on the home page of the team's website.

http://www.k-state.edu/wrestling/

Congrats to the KSU club, good to see them succeed.

Seniors, don't let KU not currently having a club discourage you from a college visit to Lawrence. Reforming the wrestling club wouldn't be that hard for someone who would like to get it going again. There is also a pretty good sized Judo club and other martial arts clubs on and off campus.

I would really like to see KU's club up and running again too. KU seems to make it a little more difficult for a booster club to help as much in organizing their club team. A motivated and dedicated student or group of students is going to have to step up and get the team up and running again. I hope a student or group of interested KU students will come forward to make this happen.

The current difference with the KSU team is that the KSU club team is up and running successfully. I believe it finished 13th in the national club tournament last year with one national individual champion. I think it has a good chance for a top ten finish this year. They have a good coach who has been with the program for about six years. I believe their coach won the national coach of the year last year. The coach runs practices for the team five to six days a week. Their booster club has been pretty active assisting the club over the last several years. It is an established successful college wrestling club program with a successful track record. This might be an incentive to a wrestler who wants to be an All-American club wrestler and also desires to be part of a club team that wants to contend for the national club championship.

I am not saying the KSU Club is not a good thing, but its a club. Kinda like the chess club here at the local high school. If its such a good thing, will Newman forgo its opportunity to stay a club when the NCAA opportunity happens? Probably not. Its a good thing for guys that are not willing to put the time and effort in to compete for something other than a club championship. It promotes the sport, kinda like old timer tournaments. Yah its wrestling but....... They have some quality guys that would help the real programs in Kansas compete at a higher level. If they have the will to work that hard. I am by no means saying they dont work hard, wrestling by nature is tough no matter what. But I would venture to say they dont have such a rigid schedule of practice and competition as the other non club institutions in the state.

Anyone be willing to give some guidance on how one could bring back the KU club? With my brother not wrestling anymore winters will be pretty bad with no wrestling.

Sport Club Director
Jason Krone
204 SRFC
864-0792
jkrone@ku.edu

Program Manager
Carin Olson
204 SRFC
864-4519
sclubs@ku.edu

Program Manager
Ryne Tusten
204 SRFC
864-4519
sclubs@ku.edu

http://www.recreation.ku.edu/programs/sport_clubs/contact.shtml

All it would take is some one who wanted to start the club, then gain memberships. There are 2 pretty-much brand new, full sized Jayhawk-branded mats that are just sitting in storage collecting dust right now. They're nice.

Joe,
Vince and I would be more than willing to help you get things rolling. Brett is right, lots of good gear, mat and equipment for the using. Whatever you need let me know.

The barriers have been the school policies reducing or eliminating outside organization. We would very much like to see KU have the booster program that helped KSU stay around and get strong.

Personally, I think our D1 energies need to be directed towards getting the KU club and others in the state operational and strong. Then the jucos back strong and the smaller schools such as Ottawa, Baker, etc.

Klint Deere

Joe: If you want, I can show you all the gear we have if you come to the Rec Center sometime during the afternoon.

All the club needs really is student sponsorship. Then they get a proportion of the overall Student Club budget. After that, the money can come pretty much from where ever.

These are the current clubs and times that use the martial arts room (judo mats are currently down):

Capoeira--Monday/Wednesday 5-7 pm, Saturday 1-3 pm
Judo--Tuesday/Thursday/Sunday 5-7 pm
Karate--Tuesday/Thursday 9-11 pm
Ki-Aikido--Tuesday/Thursday 7-9 pm, Saturday 10-noon
Kumdo/Kendo--Monday/Wednesday 9-11 pm, Saturday 7-9 pm
Tae Kwan Do--Monday/Wednesday/Sunday 7-9 pm

Plenty of open times for a wrestling team.

Klint is totally right: STUDENT INITIATION IS KEY!

I would really love to get involved and get it rolling. Shoffy, do you still have my number? I don't know alot of former wrestlers that would be willing to get involved at KU. Any know of some names?

Joe, i would definitely be interested in getting the club going. I know a few former wrestlers who go to KU that I could ask about interest.

Connor McMullen
lefty80@ku.edu
785-737-3544

Joe Z. and I chatted for a while last night, and I believe he has decieded to try and get things rolling! So if you know of people at KU who can/want to join, let them know to contact Joe (maybe in a couple days when midterms have settled down). I am going to talk with our Sport Club Director this afternoon to get some more details for everyone.

This is great news to see that the KU Club looks like it is going to get rolling again. I know Klint Deere and Shane Miller put a lot of time in coaching a couple of years ago. It would be good for KSU's club too if KU could keep their club active going forward. I think there are a decent number of good former high school wrestlers at KU too. Joe, Brett and Connor keep the ball rolling.