By Mike Ramczyk
Sports Editor
MADISON – The match was over, but Burlington sophomore Josh Bird couldn’t get up.
The 132-pound wrestler sat on the Kohl Center mat Saturday night with his hands on his head and stared at the ground. He had just lost the Division 1 state championship match after being pinned in 5:13 by Kaukauna’s Robert Lee, who Bird beat for the 120-pound state title last year.
Bird slowly got to his feet, walked over to coach Jade Gribble for consolation, shook the Kaukauna coach’s hand and began a slow retreat back to the locker room. The embattled warrior was on the verge of tears.
On the medal stand, as he accepted his second-place hardware, Bird couldn’t help but display a despondent look. He still wondered what went wrong. What could’ve been.
This was a tough loss. Bird was attempting to become the first back-to-back state champion in school history. However, Bird couldn’t get anything going offensively, and Lee was too much in the second and third periods.
“We knew how Robert was going to wrestle,” Gribble said. “Josh was having trouble attacking. Josh is disappointed. He works incredibly hard and puts an enormous amount of time and effort in. I think Josh will work hard and be in a position to win again next year.”
“I’m incredibly proud of Josh. It’s tough because he sets his goals much higher. He’s a great young man, and he will be back.”
Both wrestlers felt each other out in the first period, and neither scored a point. In the second period, Lee chose down and managed an escape to build a 1-0 lead. Then, Lee added a takedown, giving him a 3-0 advantage heading into the third period.
In the third, Bird started down but couldn’t get away. Lee scored a near fall then finished with a pin with 48 seconds left on the clock.
Bird finished the season 26-2. Lee ended up 46-3.
Bird declined comment after the match. Check out Thursday’s Burlington Standard Press for comments from Bird and more from Burlington’s state tournament experience.
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