LBHS sophomore Audrey Shockley has been wrestling since the eighth grade.
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Three place at Perry
Woodward News 12/11/05
PERRY - Joey Miller led a group of three Woodward placers in the Perry Invitational wrestling tournament Saturday.
Miller finished second at 103 pounds, defeating Josh Griffin, of Midwest City in the semifinals and losing to John Keller of
Wichita Bishop Carroll, 4-1.
Michael Comstock won three matches in the consolation rounds, including a double overtime thriller, before losing and placing fourth at 171 pounds. Zach White was sixth at 140 pounds. The Boomers were 13th in the team standings. Midwest
City, Ponca City and Stillwater fmished in the top three slots.
Here are the results. Woodward wrestler listed first.
103 - Joey Miller def. Josh Griffin, Midwest City, 6-0; lost
to John Keller, Bishop Carroll,(Kansas) 4-1. Second place.
140 - Zach White lost to Mark Meyer, Midwest City, 7-0;
lost to Mitch Arnold, Bishop Carroll, 11-5; pinned by Aaron Fredrico, Muskogee. Sixth place.
145 - Luis Baeza pinned Drew Byrd, Altus, 1:21; lost to Kyle Baldwin, Ponca City, 13-6.
152 - Stoney Swearingim pinned by Aaron Gregory, Harrah, 4:16.
171 - Michael Comstock def. Tyler Miller, Marlow, 7-6; def. Matt Crossland, Choctaw; 7-5; def. Nick Kretezschma , Midwest City, double overtime; lost to Dusty Ward, Perry, 3-0. Fourth place.
189 - Earl Hunt pinned by Chris Hill, Midwest City, 0:42
215 - Derek Branson pinned by Matt Welch, Midwest City,2:03.
The Boomers will host Geary and Burns Flat-Dill City on Tuesday, then go to the' Kingfisher Tournament Friday and Saturday.
Woodward News 11/9/05
Woodward results at Perry rournament.
The Boomers have seven wrestlers still in the tournament with Joey Miller and Zach White in the championship semifinals.
Woodward wrestlers listed first.
103 - Joey Miller def. C.C. Johnson, Muskogee, 8-2; pinned Marl Luetking, Altus, 0:41. Semifinals vs. Josh Griffin, Midwest City.
119 - John Davis pinned by Tyson Bernarte, Choctaw, 2:26; pinned by Issac Johnston, Bishop Carroll, 4:09
130 - Ramon Marin lost to Jacob Peck, Marlow, 11-2; lost to Austin Standich, Stillwater, 12-4.
140 - Zach White def. Cody Bickerstaff, Marlow, 7-6; def. Ryan Miller, Ponca City, 15-7. Semifinals vs. Mark Meyer, Midwest City.
145 - Luis Baeza bye; pinned by Derek Brown, Marlow, 1 :45. Wrestles in consolations.
152 - Stoney Swearingim pinned by Randy White, Catoosa, 2:35; pinned Ian Ralf, Blackwell, 2:31. Wrestles in consolations.
160 - Kyle Simpson pinned by Justin Whisenhunt, Harrah, 4:56; pinned by Curtis Liken, Bishop Carroll, 1:45.
171 - Michael Comstock lost to Nick Kretezschma, Midwest City, 7-5, ot; def. Ben Meyer, Bishop Carroll, 3-2. Wrestles in consolations.
189 - Earl Hunt pinned by Bryce Beclcwith, Perry, 0:37; bye. Wrestles 'in consolations.
215- Derek Branson lost to Traynor Tetik, Perry, 5-3; bye.Wrestles in consolations.
275 - John Odell pinned by Mitch Hulett, Arkansas City, 5:48; lost to Chad Grandstaff, Midwest City, 11-1
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Frisco Centennial High School Wrestling Team.
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Titans dominate Frisco at dual meet
By: JIM DONOVAN, Staff Writer 12/09/2005
Frisco and Centennial's wrestling teams met on the mat for the first time of the 2005 season at Centennial on Tuesday.
Both the Titans and Lady Titans cruised to wins as the boys dominated 65-17 and the girls won 33-18.
Josh Tew set the pace for the Titans, winning the meet's first match by pinning Frisco's Nathan Lloyd in only 36 seconds.
Centennial won 12 of the boys' 15 matches, eight of which came via pin.
To add injury to insult, Frisco's Greg Morris was penalized during the 125-pound match for unsportsmanlike conduct after being pinned at 3:30 of the first round. The penalty somewhat demoralized the Raccoons, and Centennial went onto claim victory in the following five matches.
Centennial head coach Mike Eaton did not have much to say about the win except, "It was ugly."
In the girls dual Centennial won six of the nine matches. Kaitlyn Brussow was unable to compete in the 215-pound match and won via forfeit because Frisco did not have a wrestler at the same weight class.
Centennial's Ashley Lee won one of two 165-pound matches by pin in only 19 seconds, the quickest match of the season thus far for the Lady Titans.
The match of the meet was between Centennial's Kiresten Gunia and Frisco's Brandi Blades. After three rounds and 15 minutes of intense wrestling, the two girls were tied in points and were forced to wrestle in an overtime period. Gunia finally claimed the win 6-4 in overtime thanks to a pin and an escape.
Centennial's boys team also wrestled against Flower Mound on Tuesday in a non-district dual meet.
After winning the 103-, 112-, and 119-pound bouts, Flower Mound went on to win eight of the final 12 matches to beat the Titans, 36-28.
Three of those wins came via major decision (six points for winning team) while the others were won by pin (three) and regular decision (two).
"We should have beaten them with what we had, but two of our starters were gone and they could have made a big difference," said Eaton. "We also lost a couple of matches we probably should have won."
One wrestler who was injured during practice was senior Matt Crook. Crook leads all Titans in match points with 49 and is second in match wins with nine.
Despite the loss "it was a good match. We came back decently, but we could have done a little bit better," Eaton said in the loss.
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This girl just wants to have fun -- beating the guys
BY ALAN DELL 12/08/05
CORRESPONDENT
|
LBHS sophomore Audrey Shockley has been wrestling since the eighth grade. |
She has made two boys cry and another quit, but Audrey Shockley is not out to hurt anyone. The Lemon Bay High sophomore just wants to prove girls can more than hold their own in a sport once considered a male domain.
Shockley is not the first female wrestler at Lemon Bay High, but after winning six of her first eight matches, the 112-pounder is sending shock waves around the state.
The 5-foot-3 Shockley would like to be the first female to place at states, and Lemon Bay head coach Greg Rivera believes she has a good chance with two more seasons ahead of her after this year.
But before anyone forms an opinion about her, Shockley wants it known that she considers herself feminine and would like to get married some day.
For now, though, she just likes to beat up on the boys.
"I like being tough, and I like exercising until I can't take it anymore," Shockley said. "When I beat a guy on the wrestling mat, there is no feeling to describe it. It's an amazing feeling when they raise your head (to signify the victor) in a match against a guy. Everyone is just like 'Oh my God.'"
Shockley, who first started wrestling in the eighth grade just for fun, has always been competitive against guys.
"I think I was born that way," the 16-year-old said.
Despite all her success, Shockley believes there are limits to where she wants to go in the sport.
"I think it would be cool to wrestle in college, but I don't want to be manly," she said. "There are a lot of girls wrestling who are not feminine at all and have arms like guys. I don't want that. I want to be girlie."
Shockley concedes that nearly every guy she wrestles is stronger than she is. She beats them on technique and smarts, which she learned from Rivera.
"When I beat a guy, they are amazed because they see a girl and think it's going to be easy," Shockley said. "Every guy I wrestle is stronger than me. I rely on technique, and I outsmart and out-think them. I use some muscle, but not as much as them. Coach Rivera taught me how to do that and helped me develop my style."
Though wrestling is a big part of her life, it is far from the only thing.
Shockley is one of the most eclectic individuals at Lemon Bay. The popular sophomore is class president and a JV cheerleader. She also runs cross country and is on the Lemon Bay girls track and weight-lifting teams.
"Cross country is my favorite sport because I like running so much.
But wrestling is what I like to compete in the most," Shockley said.
Her toughest competition has come from several all-girl tournaments she was in during the club season.
"When I first went into the girls' national freestyle tournament last year, I lost every match and I got ripped apart," Shockley said. "They were really tough. The second time I went, I didn't do too bad. The girls at nationals were better than half the guys I know."
Shockley says she is worried about the cauliflower ear that many wrestlers develop after years of grappling on the mats, but she won't let any of her fears derail her from her goal.
"It's been a long dream of mine to place at states, and I hope by the time I am a senior I can do that," Shockley said.
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Wrestling came naturally to Sibley High's Mariah Beaman as she followed in dad's footsteps. For now, she has her eye on making varsity. Beyond that, the Olympics.
BY RICK SHEFCHIK
Pioneer Press 12/10/05
The most remarkable thing about Mariah Beaman's presence on the Henry Sibley wrestling team is that no one thinks it's remarkable. Anymore.
As a 14-year-old freshman girl trying to wrestle her way into the varsity lineup at the high school in Mendota Heights, Beaman remains a novelty in the sport. There are only a handful of girls on varsity wrestling teams in Minnesota — yet the occurrence no longer is surprising.
"I've seen it throughout the years," said her coach, Prentice Smith. "Our own Henry Sibley kids have competed against females from other teams. You're probably hard-pressed to go the whole year and not see one. I've probably seen at least one female compete each year, if not more."
Having seen girls wrestle makes it that much easier for Beaman's male teammates to treat her as just another member of the team.
"They don't seem to have a problem with it," Beaman said. "They respect me, and I respect them. Sometimes opponents kind of look at me like I'm different, but they really shouldn't, because I'm a wrestler, not a girl. It shouldn't make any difference."
Increasingly, it doesn't.
Beaman was captain of her junior high team last year and is 4-1 this season in junior varsity and freshman matches. She also runs track and plays volleyball. But wrestling runs in her family: Her father, Wayne, was an outstanding wrestler at Bemidji State and later became a coach.
When she was in first grade, her father would take her to the gym and her three siblings on nights when her mother worked. Her dad would teach wrestling holds to her older brother, Troy, now a senior on the Sibley varsity. After a year of watching, Beaman asked her father if she could get in on the fun.
"My dad and my brother helped a lot," she said. "It was nice to have my dad there. I could ask him anything."
Now Wayne Beaman is an assistant to Smith on the Sibley varsity, and Smith said his presence both helps his daughter learn the sport and smooth the logistical difficulties that can arise on a mixed-gender team.
"With weighing and checking weight, Wayne's good at making sure the locker room's open, and taking care of things that, if you have just one gender, you don't think about," Smith said.
That's about it as far as gender issues go. Wayne Beaman expects female wrestlers to continue to make inroads in the sport, even though there will be strength disparities.
The opposing teams' coaches don't have a problem with their boys wrestling against Mariah, her father said. She has been wrestling since elementary school and has been in junior high matches and tournaments for years.
"Most of the coaches she runs into she already knows," Wayne Beaman said. "It's not like there's anything new. They're going to wrestle her, and they know that. Wrestling's wrestling. The gender thing doesn't come into play too much."
Except that his daughter, and all female high school wrestlers, almost exclusively will be wrestling boys for the foreseeable future.
"There's the obvious physical end of it," Wayne Beaman said. "Boys continue to mature and get stronger — not that she isn't, but physically she is going to get challenged more and more. Guys just seem to mature more and physically become stronger. That's going to be the biggest challenge."
It's a challenge Mariah Beaman and other female wrestlers are increasingly willing and eager to face. She said she has talked to a number of girls at school who have expressed interest in trying wrestling.
Her father says it's a trend in the sport that will not be reversed.
"There are going to be girls that wrestle," he said. "It's going to happen, especially since there's women's wrestling in Olympics now. This is something coming down the road. It may or may not suit everybody, but somewhere along the way somebody has to break the ground. Basically, that's what she's doing. It's exciting."
For now, Mariah's future on the Sibley team is in her hands. Smith said she is a JV-caliber wrestler, with the possibility of cracking the varsity lineup at some point this year, depending on the weight. She will wrestle some freshman league matches and get as many opportunities to crack the varsity lineup as anyone else.
"Right now, she's behind a senior at the 135 class," Smith said. "Depending on the meets and the matchups, she's on the border of getting some varsity experience. As a 135-pound freshman female, she's wrestling some kids who are pretty physical."
How good can she be?
"It's not fair to say," Smith said. "Who knows how much she'll grow, how much taller she'll get?"
Mariah Beaman isn't sure whether she would choose volleyball or wrestling if she were forced to pick.
"I'm kind of going with either one, whichever I get a scholarship in," she said.
She does know there is a future for a girl who likes to wrestle.
"I'd really be excited to go to the Olympics in wrestling," she said.
"The more you see women's wrestling get to the Olympic stage, and the more weight classes they have, the more you'll see women's wrestling," her dad said. "There's going to be a call for it."
Rick Shefchik can be reached at rshefchik@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-5577.
Did you know?
• The standout high school girl wrestler in Minnesota this year is Blue Earth senior Kelli Rasmussen, the first girl to compete on Blue Earth's varsity. Last season, she had a 23-9 record and won the conference championship at 103 pounds.
• Chelynne Pringle was 33-1 as a senior last year at Forest Lake High School and is ranked third nationally at 121 pounds in the women's Team USA Rankings. She was named first-team girls high school all-America by TheMat.com/ASICS. She attends college and trains at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo.
• Ali Bernard of New Ulm High School, now a freshman at the University of Regina (Saskatchewan, Canada), was the U.S. high school wrestler of the year in 2004 as well as a U.S. national senior champion and 2003 junior world champion. not just for boys
• Eleven girls wrestled at the varsity level in Minnesota last year, compared with 8,677 boys, according to the National Federation of High School Associations.
• Seven U.S. colleges and universities, including the University of Minnesota-Morris, and another 17 in Canada offer women's varsity wrestling programs.
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Local girls tussle with boys on mat
12/09/05
GRANTS - Wrestling just is not a sport for males anymore.
The Grants High School (GHS) Pirate wrestling team has two females competing on the mats. Junior Brittany Jewel (103 pound) and junior Faith Cooper (171pound) are both first-year grapplers.
The girls each had a different reason for joining the sport. Cooper said that all the wrestlers that she has met have been awesome people and she wanted to be a part of that. Jewel said her cousins inspired her to try the sport. Both said at first they were nervous to wrestle, but now they are having fun and enjoy the sport.
Coach Billy Ashbaugh said the two have come a long way and he is proud of them. “They do a good job and they do not get any special treatment on the mat just because they are girls,” he said.
“I have realized that I am weaker than I ever thought I was,” said Cooper. “You have to be strong to wrestle, but I am getting there.”
The girls were managers for the team last year, so wrestling is not new to them. “When I was a manager, I used to yell things to the boys, you know, like the things I would hear them yell to each other, but I found out I had no idea what I was talking about. This year I do,” said Cooper.
Jewel said she has learned more self-confidence since joining the team and Ashbaugh said both girls have displayed confidence on the mat and are learning a lot about the sport.
“Wrestlers work really hard for what they do. They really discipline themselves. I do not know of any other sport that works this hard,” said Jewel.
The girls agree that “happy hour” is the hardest thing about wrestling. Ashbaugh describes happy hour as intense conditioning. “The kids call it “Uncle Billy’s Happy Hour,” he said. “No, it is death!” exclaimed Cooper.
In the end, both girls said it will be awesome the first time they pin or beat a male on the mat.
By Scott Ford
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Female wrestler ready to take years of experience to the mat
12/02/05
Standing just over the five-foot mark and weighing only a biscuit or two over 100 pounds, this Hortonville Polar Bear doesn't resemble the average high school athlete.
Such tiny dimensions won't do much for this compact-sized athlete on the basketball court. But this Hortonville freshman is at home on the wrestling mat and doesn't look out of place grappling with opponents — even though there is a difference.
This petite-looking Polar Bear is a girl.
Katlin Vande Hei — the only female on Chris Gennrich's Hortonville wrestling team — will open the season as the team's 103-pound varsity wrestler.
Vande Hei is no novelty act and won't be wrestling out of her league. Chances are she will quickly silence any snickers, because she is considered to be a decent wrestler and has competed in the sport since the fifth grade.
"She won't be just out there," said Gennrich. "She has pinned one of our 125-pounders."
Vande Hei's reasons for entering a prep wrestling world populated almost exclusively by boys aren't about gaining attention or breaking down barriers. She just likes to mix it up on the mat. She watched her older brother, Anthony Vande Hei, Hortonville's outstanding 119-pound sophomore, wrestle early in his elementary school years and got the wrestling bug.
"I wanted to do it too, but my mom wouldn't let me for awhile," said Katlin. "I kept bugging her and finally she let me join, figuring that it would be better if I started early."
Katlin Vande Hei says she hasn't been treated any differently than any other Polar Bear.
"I don't think anyone has given her any 'guff,'" said Luke Rynish, Hortonville's exceptional 160-pounder. "We had a girl on the team last year and she got a lot of 'guff.' This year, it seems like everyone is more welcoming. They're setting goals on winning rather than thinking, 'Oh, she shouldn't be here."
Anthony Vande Hei admits that having his little sister on the team is a bit odd.
"It's a little weird, but she's not doing too bad," said Anthony Vande Hei. "Most of the guys have been pretty good about it."
There aren't many girls competing in Wisconsin high school wrestling, but it is becoming more accepted each year. Tomahawk High School's Alyssa Lampe has provided credibility for her gender by advancing to the state individual tournament each of the past two seasons.
"I've got no problem with it," said Gennrich. "My practices are hard and anyone who can get through them gets my respect right there."
Gennrich sees parallels between the two Vande Heis, especially in terms of energy.
"She's just like her older brother," said Gennrich. "She goes 110 miles per hour and is a tough, physical kid."
Katlin Vande Hei's goals for the season are modest. She just wants to be competitive and get maybe three or four pins.
"I'm just looking to bring it all out," she said. "I don't think it (wrestling against boys) is a big deal. But when guys lose to you, it makes them pretty mad. It's kind of fun to watch that."
Here's hoping that Katlin Vande Hei, a kid with enough guts and courage to compete in a male-dominated sport, has lots of fun watching opponents scowl the next four years.
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Bayelsa wins Dr Egwu wrestling competition
Rejis Anukwuoji • Saturday, December 10, 2005
Bayelsa State was declared the over-all winner of Dr Sam Egwu's National Open Amateur Wrestling championship concluded earlier in the week, at the Women Development Centre Abakaliki, Ebonyi state.
Bayelsa sacred 66 points in over-all free style male and 48 points in Greco Romans to clinch the top position in the competition.
In the female category, Cross River State scored the highest point of 50, Lagos came second with 44 points while Bayelsa came third with 41 points.
Also in the male free style, Delta State scored 51 points, while Ogun came next with 41 points. Platuea State scored 43 points in Greco Roman followed by Edo State with 42 points.
Speaking during the closing ceremony, the national president of Amateur Wrestlers, Chief Austine Edeze expressed happiness at the level of maturity that existed at the competition
He said the championship was uniqued because it was coming three years after amateur wrestling was last organised in the country.
He thanked the states that participated and explained that the competition will help them to assess themselves for the forthcoming National Sports Festival in Ogun State.
Three new champions were discovered from the Abakaliki tournament replacing the older ones.
He called on other state governments to emulate Ebonyi State and develop interest in sponsoring wrestling.
The wrestling board donated some wrestling equipment to Ebonyi State Sport Council to help them develop wrestling in the state.
It has also concluded plans to organise refresher courses for Amateur wrestlers in the state.
In his remarks, the Ebonyi State Governor, Dr Sam Egwu, promised to make the competition an annual event in the state as part of his contribution to the development of the sports.
He equally promised to sponsor the Amateur wrestling athletes overseas to enable them develop their respective talents and be exposed to the outside world.