Wauwatosa West/East wrestling failed to send an athlete to the state tournament for the first time since 2000 following the Oconomowoc Sectional on Saturday.
Only one wrestler had previous experience going into the sectional round for the team, which proved to play a pivotal role in Saturday's results.
Wauwatosa's 125-pounder Demetrius Mensah made his third consecutive trip to sectionals, but was unable to improve on his fourth-place finish at last year's sectional when he lost to Elkhorn Area's Taylor French in round one.
"We felt like we really needed to control the tempo of the match for 'D' to have success," Tosa head coach Kent Morin said. "Unfortunately, he never got it going. You have to credit French from Elkhorn who came out and immediately went on the offense, which is exactly the strategy that we needed to implement."
All five of the local wrestlers failed to get past their first-round matches, which abruptly ended their seasons.
285-pound Kevin Kanngieser hoped to continue Wauwatosa's run of successful heavyweights, but Mukwonago's Tyler Ladwig assured him that it wasn't going to happen when he pinned him in 3 minutes, 41 seconds.
"We felt like he would be able to throw his opponent from Mukwonago, but he never felt comfortable enough to hit it," Morin said. "Kevin too, is a first-year wrestler, so hopefully next year he comes back with a higher confidence level and is able to hit his best stuff."
Tosa's Patrick Campbell (119 pounds), Cory Jay (152) and Dylan Kissinger (160) all lost by pin to highly successful wrestlers from Mukwonago and Elkhorn Area.
"Overall, a tough ending, but we are a young team and hopefully we come back next year with more experience and confidence," Morin said.
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