The Zone 2 wrestling team has returned from the Alberta Winter Games, Feb. 16-19, with a bronze medal and several individual medals and strong performances.

Formed by 12 members of the Cochrane Cowboys with fill athletes from outside the zone, the team came out of the round robin with two wins and a lost and beat Sunny South Zone 1 for the bronze medal.

In the round-robin, Zone 2 won their first two matchups against Northeastern Alberta zone 8 (including Fort McMurray), 58-30, then Peace Country Zone 7 (including Grande Prairie), 46-44, before losing to Calgary, 63-30, who were the eventual tournament winner.

Eleven of the 19 wrestlers on the team made it to the medal round in individual competitions and several returned with hardware. Sofia Preece won a gold, Jaityn Labelle, Ben Morrison (fill from different zone) and Autumn Shopa won silver and Cathrine Swedlo and Eli Fines earned bronze. Fourth place finishers: were Jonathan Vance (fill from different zone), Nicholas Hooper, Keath Dostaler, Brendan Maguire and Ayyub Fanta (fill from different zone).

Head coach Frank Dostaler, also of the Cochrane Cowboys, was thrilled with the performance of the wrestlers.

"They exceeded my expectations and I could not be happier. With all the wrestling over, they're coming home with lots of bruises and bumps and sore shoulders and everything is aching, but they're laughing and having fun and bonding. It was just a fantastically positive experience for them all," he said while being interviewed on the long bus ride home.

"Our younger girls stepped up at the right time and they performed exceptionally. They wrestled to their peak performance."

He was especially impressed with the performance of Eli Fines who earned a bronze.

"Not by any means the best wrestler of the tournament, the kid that surprised me the most was Eli Fines. He's just a little Tasmania devil."

"When it comes into a scramble, seven out of 10 times he's coming out of that scramble with more points than the other kid. He's just naturally athletic in that way."

Dostaler, though, is disappointed the pools continue to be structured the same way each year and prevents Zone 2 from competing in the gold medal match. The Zone 2 team is consistently strong in the tournament and scored more points than Edmonton, but being in the same pool as the dominant Calgary team each time means it's always a Calgary-Edmonton final.

"It's a shame because we constantly come out as the second strongest team but we never get a chance at silver. We can never win a silver because we're always in the same pool as Calgary, which puts us second place and puts us in the bronze medal match every time. I think we've won bronze three times in a row."

For the most part, he's impressed with how well Fort McMurray did as hosts.

"The facilities were good, the hosts were welcoming, warm, professional and kind and the volunteers were amazing. What they put forth, given what they have been through a few years ago, was amazing."