All-RTC4 boys wrestling: After making it under the Gainbridge lights, NM’s Hoover is Wrestler of the Year

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

RTC4 Boys Wrestler of the Year Hartley Hoover

North Miami senior Hartley Hoover is everything one might want in a wrestler.

He is strong enough that he can overpower most opponents. And if you are one of the few that can match him in strength, he moves so well that he is a great defensive wrestler.

It all clicked to the point where he became the first wrestler in the history of his school to make it to a state championship match. Hoover lost to Crown Point’s Ceasar Salas, a top 15 wrestler nationally at 215, by decision, but just making it to the state finals figures to inspire a generation of future Warriors to try to get to the same place that he did.

As a result, Hoover is our RTC4 Boys Wrestler of the Year and the first North Miami athlete to be an athlete of the year in any sport.

Needless to say, wrestling has never been more popular than it has been here. North Miami won the Class 1A Team State Duals. Rochester beat North Miami at the McKee Invitational just before Christmas.

And for the second straight year, a wrestler from Winamac made the state finals.

Those three schools are just engines of talent, churning out great wrestlers and making this part of the state a hub for young wrestlers.

You are about to see that in our list of All-RTC4 wrestlers. As always, we pick one first-team wrestler and one honorable mention wrestler for every weight class.

We thank area coaches for sending us their stats, and we also thank them for their time. They provide important context for how well their wrestlers did.

Having said that, this list is ours and ours alone, and we take full responsibility. We place extra emphasis on performance at conference tournaments and advancement in the state tournament series.

With the addition of North Miami to the RTC area, making this list became even more difficult.

First team

• 106 – Braxton Hester (Rochester) – Hester tore through the Plymouth sectional to win the title, but his season mysteriously ended at that point. Still, he faced a brutal schedule – the Three Rivers Conference was particularly tough at 106 – and reaped the rewards at the end.

• 113 – Tanner Horn (Rochester) – Horn beat Hunter Duncan at the McKee Invite, so he is our pick. Horn is slippery and good positionally. The next step is developing a little more offense, but it was a terrific freshman year for Horn.

• 120 – Braylon McIntire (North Miami) – McIntire went 3-0 against Jackson Robbins, so he is our choice. McIntire had four losses – one in the semistate and three at state. He was always moving and able to get himself out of tough positions.

• 126 – Rex Moore (North Miami) – Moore transferred in from Manchester, and a great program shot to the moon. Moore’s only losses came on Day 2 of the state finals. He is technically impressive and tough as nails.

• 132 – Layne Horn (Rochester) – Just about any conversation about the Rochester wrestling GOAT will have to include Horn, who placed at state for the second straight year after qualifying for state in 2023 and 2024. He was also a four-time regional champ, a rarity even at Rochester. Most wrestlers had no chance against Horn, but what impressed us most was how he improvised his style once he got to semistate and state.

• 138 – Santiago Silva (North Miami) – Silva pinned Hayden Taylor to win the Hoosier North title, so he is our selection. He won 33 matches and is another wrestler who is symbolic of North Miami’s strong culture.

• 144 – Kael Buschman (Culver) – Buschman won this weight class at the conference tournament, and it might have been the toughest weight class at conference. He then finished sectional before a heartbreaking loss in the regional ticket round. Still, he won 34 matches, and he still has two years left.

• 150 – Asher Jones (Winamac) – Jones, a junior, bumped up from 144 and made his first semistate trip this year. His season was highlighted by a major decision over Mishawaka’s Brayden Reed at the Penn regional. Jones lost to Eli Winters at conference, but Jones made semistate and Winters did not, so Jones is our pick.

• 157 – Cooper Pattison (North Miami) – Pattison dominated the Hoosier North, and he finished with 33 wins in a brutal weight class. A pin over Rochester’s Braddock Behling made him stand out.

• 165 – Brant Beck (Rochester) – A Wabash College recruit, Beck went 45-3 as a senior, and two of his losses were to the state champion (Matthew Staples) and the state runner-up (Aidan Kincaide). He refined his attack and became a much better wrestler from the top position.

• 175 – Kale Shotts (Rochester) – Shotts had a style based in Greco-Roman wrestling that was atypical for a Rochester wrestler, but he made it work for himself and just overpowered wrestlers with his upper body strength. He made it to the semistate ticket round, and with more mat time, he will be hard to keep out of the state tournament.

• 190 – Jordan Simon (North Miami) – Simon responded to a heartbreaking loss in the semistate ticket round at 175 in 2025 by making it to state at 190 in 2026. Nobody was in his zip code at the conference meet, and he also pinned Derek Wortley at Team State Duals.

• 215 – Hartley Hoover (North Miami) (Wrestler of the Year) – Hoover also won the Fort Wayne semistate and beat Tearson Wolford twice, among his many accomplishments.

• HWT – Declan Gard (Rochester) – Gard did not place at state, but one could argue that he had a more dominant year on the mat than he did last year, when he did place at state. He won sectional and regional, but his most memorable win might have been in the semistate ticket round over Crown Point’s Tony Brooks.

Honorable mention

• 106 – Justin Housinger (Winamac)

• 113 – Hunter Duncan (North Miami)

• 120 – Jackson Robbins (Rochester)

• 126 – Grant Holloway (Rochester)

• 132 – Tyler Tacheny (North Miami)

• 138 – Hayden Taylor (Winamac)

• 144 – Riley Collins (North Miami)

• 150 – Eli Winters (North Miami)

• 157 – Rian Shell (Winamac)

• 165 – Broderick Reutebuch (Winamac)

• 175 – Theron Carrington (Culver)

• 190 – Derek Wortley (Rochester)

• 215 – Tearson Wolford (Winamac)

• HWT – Logan Smith (North Miami)

RTC Boys Wrestler of the Year

• 2021: Bazle Owens (Tippecanoe Valley)

• 2022: Marshall Fishback (Rochester)

• 2023: Alex Deming-Brady Beck (Rochester)

• 2024: Brant Beck-Brady Beck (Rochester)

• 2025: Brant Beck-Layne Horn (Rochester)

• 2026: Hartley Hoover (North Miami)