Posted: Feb. 27, 2010 |(0) Comments

Wrestling against three-time state champion Jesse Thielke of Germantown must be like shielding yourself from a category five tornado with only a flimsy piece of plywood as protection.

Try as you might, you're only going to get blown away.

Just listen to Brookfield East's Justin Wolfenden (43-8), the latest person to get into Thielke's way Saturday night in the WIAA State Individual Division I 125-pound finals at the Kohl Center in Madison.

Wolfenden, unfortunately, turned out to be little more than speed-bump in Thielke's way of his third straight title, as he was the third wrestler in four to suffer a technical fall (19-4 in the third period) at the hands of the talented Warhawk junior in the tournament.

The signature moment in the match came late in the first period, with the score already 10-2, after Thielke had used a variety of leg and upperbody attacks to completely flummox the otherwise solid Spartan wrestler, moving so quickly that Wolfenden barely had time to turn his head before he was flat on the mat, the victim of yet another takedown.

At that point in the match, everyone could see Wolfenden just shake his head in disbelief at what was happening to him.

"Oh yeah," chuckled Wolfenden after the awards ceremony at the Kohl Center in Madison. "That was just me saying 'Oh well, what can I do?'"

Indeed.

"I mean, he's just so dominant," the Spartan senior added. "There's just not a lot of breathing room. You can't afford mistakes against him and I made some. He's just on a whole other level."

Thielke (47-0) intends it that way.

"Definitely," he said. "I come here to win. Use hustle and work hard and put myself in a league of my own."

Thielke had wrestled Wolfenden in the summer and lost to him on a disqualification for unnecessary roughness.

"It may have been a controverstial call at the time, but it doesn't matter now," added Thielke.

But don't let anyone think it didn't play into his thinking. Thielke came into this season with the mantra "Complete domination" imprinted on his mind.

He made that point loud and clear to the opponents at state, outscoring his four elite level foes by a preposterous 70-11 count.

"This isn't unusual," he said without a trace of arrogance, just absolute confidence in his voice. "If I get my hands on you, you're going down and you will probably be going to your back. If I get the leg, that's fine. If I don't I'll go to something else. I just want to get that next point and I won't stop working the whole time until the match is done."

First-year Warhawk coach Casey Gabrielson, a state medalist in his own right at Germantown and who also coached elite wrestlers in a short stint in Hawaii, is no longer stunned by what he sees match in and match out from Thielke.

"He is just something special," Gabrielson said. "I've never seen a better technician. I coached a four-time (champ) in Hawaii, but Jesse would just make him look like a normal champion. He's just a complete step above."

And he's not one likely to get ahead of himself.  He's now one of 47 wrestlers who have won three state titles in Wisconsin history. There have only been 10 four-time state champions in Wisconsin and only one in division I (Kevin Black from River Falls, 1995-98).

But before Thielke can make that happen, comes another spring and summer of elite competition, including international trips and a potential crack at the powerhouse wrestlers taking part in the US Senior Nationals (because of his age he will need a medical waiver to compete in the latter event).

"This feels really good," he said, "but I'm just going to continue things one match a time, and when that first (high school) match comes around next fall, then I'll start thinking about it (four state titles)."

And in the process, likely start down a most inevitable road towards doing it.