WARDSVILLE - Senior leadership won't be hard to come by for the Blair Oaks wrestling team this season.
The Falcons return five seniors who qualified for the Class 1 state tournament last year, and they could have as many as 10 seniors wrestling at the varsity level this season.
"We have good senior leadership," Blair Oaks coach Tim Karsten said. "We're having good, tough practices. They're helping teach all the younger guys.
"We have a good group of freshmen this year. They're really coming along well too. It's going to be a good learning year."
Blair Oaks has put together a schedule Karsten said is tough enough to prepare his wrestlers to get past districts. The Falcons get to travel all around the state, with tournaments in Union, Lexington, Brookfield and Seneca.
"We build up toward that Lexington Tournament, where there are 45 Class 1 teams," Karsten said of the Battle of Lexington Tournament, scheduled for Dec. 16-17. "It's a tough, tough tournament for us. It gives us a chance to see how they'll do at that weight, and if they don't do well there, we can shuffle them around a little bit."
Not much has changed in the makeup of Blair Oaks' district during the realignment phase for the next two-year cycle. Seneca, the defending Class 1 state champion, remains in the district, as does Versailles, which finished fourth at state and will host the district tournament this season.
"We're in the toughest district, so I usually tell the boys, 'If you make it through this district, you're plenty ready to medal at state,'" Karsten said. "That's always our goal. We don't just go up there and celebrate being at state. We want to win matches up there."
Leading the way for Blair Oaks is senior London Gaydos, a three-time state qualifier. Gaydos finished sixth at 120 pounds his freshman year, but fell short of medaling the past two seasons. He finished with a 34-13 record last season.
"He has had some injuries, so we just need him to be healthy, and he'll have a great year," Karsten said.
Gaydos will be one of five wrestlers looking to fill three spots at 120, 126 and 132 for the Falcons.
Senior Joey Conway and sophomore Dalton Bridges have some experience at those weight classes in the past for Blair Oaks, while junior Addison Canole and freshman Caleb Meeks are also in the mix.
"In our first three tournaments, I have three different lineups to see who's going to do best," Karsten said of those three weight classes. "Sometimes it isn't really the clearest when they wrestle head-to-head. We need to see how they do against comparable competition."
The other state qualifiers returning for Blair Oaks are Scott Farley, who will wrestle at 220, and Riley Boeckman, who suffered a knee injury during the football season but is expected to return in January, will wrestle at either 182 or 195.
Also returning are senior Bo Thomas at 138 and senior Paul Karsten at 182. Both qualified for state last season but lost both their matches.
"We set high expectations for them, not just to go to state, but to do something up there," Karsten said of the Falcons' returning state qualifiers.
In the middle weights, the projected wrestlers are freshman Kyler Griep at 145, sophomore Ben Thomas at 152, senior San Dudenhoeffer at 160 and senior Clayton Roling at 170.
"Kyler Griep is a great freshman," Karsten said. "If he doesn't make it to state, he will be very disappointed. I think he has all the tools to get there as a freshman."
In the upper weights, senior Lucas Holtmeyer is at 195 and senior Kaleb Bisges is at 285, although Karsten said freshman Trustin Sherman could also see some time at 285.
Sophomore Jayce Griggs will make the bump to 113 this season, leaving Blair Oaks open at 106.
"When we have that one weight class (open), we go scour the hall to find a kid that can fill it," Karsten said. "We just couldn't convince anybody to do it this year."
The Falcons have five home dates this season. After starting the season today at the Knob Noster Tournament, Blair Oaks will host a quad-dual Thursday against Hallsville, Versailles and Southern Boone.
Blair Oaks also has three home dates in January and will wrap up the season at home against Whitfield, Centralia and Fulton on Feb. 3.
"It is a rare year for us with five home meets," Karsten said. "Usually we get two or three."
Karsten said the goal is to finish in the top 10 as a team at state. Last season, the Falcons tied for 12th place in Class 1, falling just short of their goal.
Still, he likes his team's odds to be in the mix at state again, with hopes of surpassing last year's mark of two all-state wrestlers.
"I believe when football has a successful year, it rubs off on us and we carry on having a good season as well," Karsten said.