A Manitowoc Lutheran graduate and a massive supporter of local wrestling was able to go to the state tournament this past weekend in a hands-on role.
Morgan Sickinger has been refereeing wrestling for a few years now and has finally ranked up high enough to be an off-matt ref in Madison.
“There’s 15 on-matt officials…and 26 [off-matt],” he explained. “Eventually in the future I will be getting on the matt. It might be 5-10 years from now” but he said he got his foot in the proverbial door and called it a “great experience.”
Morgan was a part of what is called “the bullpen” and was responsible for the weigh-ins every morning, meaning he was one of the first refs in the building every day.
This experience was great for his refereeing career as well, as in order to be an on-matt official, you have to work toward ranking yourself up. Morgan said he is nearly to the point where he can ref the qualifying tournaments.
“Hopefully next year I should be close to making sectionals,” he said. “Do a couple of sectionals and then you are in.”
Not only is Morgan a referee, but he also coaches a lot of young talent.
“Currently I am the vice-president of Whitelaw Warriors Wrestling Academy. We’ve got roughly 40 wrestlers on our team, helping to build the lakeshore youth programs back up,” he explained. “Right now we coach Two Rivers…Manitowoc…Valders and Reedsville kids…and then we turn around and put them back into the high schools.”
Morgan said that the talent pool locally is growing, so we are likely to see even more local wrestlers competing in Madison in the near future.
To learn more about the Whitelaw Warriors Wrestling Club, you can follow them on Facebook, or call 920-323-3530.
