Valley High's sophomore wrestler Samantha Montoya (second from right) helps her teammates roll up a mat during a recent meet. Montoya, 15, is the only girl on the varsity squad, which is coached by her father, Gary Montoya. (Erin Fredrichs/Tribune)
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High School Wrestling: Holding her own
Valley's Samantha Montoya has found success in a traditionally male sport - varsity wrestling
By Jeremy Fowler
Tribune Reporter
February 16, 2006
Hair tie in hand, Samantha Montoya throws her head back and secures her long hair as Valley High teammates scurry and crawl across gaudy maroon wrestling mats.
The 5-foot-2 sophomore is momentarily holding up the technique line, which seems more like minutes because of the boys' impatience.
But the boys can wait.
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Valley High's sophomore wrestler Samantha Montoya (second from right) helps her teammates roll up a mat during a recent meet. Montoya, 15, is the only girl on the varsity squad, which is coached by her father, Gary Montoya. (Erin Fredrichs/Tribune) |
This hair needs to be whipped into a tight bun.
Sure, Montoya, 15, is a wrestler but she is also a teenage girl with raspberry cheeks and quick-flashing eyes. Her Victoria's Secret vanilla body spray is a welcome sixth-period addition to an otherwise rank and musky Valley gym.
Yep, Montoya is becoming a woman while immersed in a competitive arena that screams masculinity.
The Vikings' top 103-pound wrestler has managed to blend powdered noses and power lifts into her repertoire.
She is arriving at the season's apex - the state wrestling tournament Friday to Saturday at the University of New Mexico's Johnson Gym - with a 9-12 record.
"I've just sat back and watched her, and I'm continually impressed," said Rebecca Betzen, Montoya's mother.
"Some people don't understand what she's doing, but she's handled it so well, so far."
Montoya isn't a rarity. There are a handful of female wrestlers in New Mexico. West Las Vegas' Vanessa Lucero, a 103-pound Class 3A wrestler, has defeated 5A opponents, including Montoya, and even won an invitational. Lucero is 26-8 and seeded No. 3 in her weight division in Class 3A.
According to the National Federation of High Schools, 4,334 female wrestlers compete nationally in 941 schools.
Montoya's success includes wins over 103-pound male opponents from Albuquerque High, Highland, Grants, Las Cruces and Carlsbad.
Her fight for supremacy on the mat isn't a feminist cause, isn't a statement for women's rights. She just enjoys wrestling, she said.
She also likes getting dolled up, as evidenced by two sliding-glass mirrors attached to her bedroom closet.
Her bathroom includes options of strawberry or cherry lip gloss and sparkly Oil of Olay lotion in a purple bottle.
"I'm a complete girl, almost a girly girl, but I'd rather compete against guys in wrestling," said Montoya.
"There's something fulfilling about wrestling that I can't get anywhere else, even if it's against guys. I did cheerleading in first and second grade, but I've always liked contact sports."
Despite her hard-edged wrestling demeanor, opponents notice her girly side.
And some like it.
Ryan Pacheco, La Cueva's 103-pounder who defeated Montoya, said Valley's most attractive wrestler has caught some second looks.
Samantha Montoya uses her mouth to keep some of her hair out of the way as she goes to work with a curling iron. "I'm totally a girly girl. I curl my hair before school everyday," she said. Reflected in Montoya's full-length mirror are ribbons, medals and trophies she has won in various sports. (Erin Fredrichs/Tribune) |
"I don't have a crush on her, but I know guys on my team who think she's really pretty," Pacheco said.
La Cueva coach Frank Baca said sometimes looks give a female wrestler an edge.
"It's hard for these male wrestlers because she's an attractive young lady," Baca said. "That might get in their heads and make it tougher to wrestle her."
Like a third-grader on the boys-only section of the school playground, Albuquerque High's Johnny Garcia prefers to stay far away from Montoya.
"I don't like them that are tommy girls," said Garcia. "You know, a girl who acts like a boy." Garcia said he lost to Montoya because "she put her hips over me."
Apparently, Garcia hasn't seen Montoya after a match when she exchanges her singlet and headgear for more conventional female attire.
Montoya's post-wrestling looks, Betzen said, can make manly wrestlers like Garcia change their tune.
"She'd go to the locker room and change into her jeans and do her hair after a match and boys would be asking for her phone number," Betzen said.
Sorry guys, but Montoya has a boyfriend named Omar Uribe, a Valley student.
It's a given that teenage girls can melt guys with smiles and flowing hair, but Montoya thinks a few guys need to accept that females can body slam, too.
Just a couple of feet from Montoya's closet mirrors hang numerous youth wrestling plaques.
Her most efficient move is the "chicken wing." It's a move where Montoya hooks one arm of the opponent and forces the other arm underneath her body. Then she attempts to roll her opponent onto his/her back.
She also said she is all business when it comes to the mats.
"I don't try to pay attention to the boys and let anything distract me from what I love doing," Montoya said.
"I'm out there to wrestle, so I focus on that. I'm showing I can do anything.
People close to Montoya have heard the whispers, questioning the wrestler's choice of sports.
"Some of the girls have thought she was crazy going into a man's sport, even when she was a junior wrestler," said Adriana Baca-Morris, Montoya's best friend. "People have said she wouldn't make it. Now she's proving them wrong because she has a varsity letter."
Montoya has also heard the whispers.
"I hear a lot of dads don't like their daughters to wrestle because it's an all-male sport. And maybe some don't like what I'm doing, but that doesn't bother me," Montoya said. "I enjoy proving people wrong."
Though Montoya spends hours each week fighting boys, the most influential figure in her life is a male - her father, Gary Montoya, the Valley wrestling coach. Dad says he never shows his daughter favor in sports.
"I'm a daddy's girl," said Montoya, one of four sisters. "He's been my coach in softball, wrestling, everything sports. He expects a lot from me and wants me to be the best, but he's taught me so much discipline."
Montoya, a second-year Vikings coach and a physical education teacher at Del Norte, says he treats his daughter like every guy on his team.
He's demanding.
Yet his relationship to his daughter changes when they hang out together at Elephant Butte Lake in southern New Mexico.
"It makes me real proud that she can be an athlete out there and that gender doesn't matter," Montoya said.
"She still has her understanding that she is a female, too. The way she's gone about everything she's done is great."
Gary can encourage his daughter with just a couple of well-timed words. They are words designed to let her know that she is holding her own in a wrestling world seemingly more suited to guys.
"When he compliments me and tells me I did a really good job, it gets to me in the best way," Montoya said.
Valley freshman Nick McMannaway spots for Samantha Montoya as she bench presses in the school weight room, while the Vikings cheerleaders practice in the background. La Cueva High wrestling coach Frank Baca said some male wrestlers find it a difficult challenge to wrestle a female opponent. (Erin Fredrichs/Tribune)
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Canete wrestles with the best at state tourney
Article published on Thursday, February 16th, 2006
By NICK SANDIN
Special to the Mirror
With the 2006 state tournament a thing of the past, one Kodiak wrestler still had a title shot. Sophomore Michelle Canete (18-15 in 2005-06 against varsity and JV girls and boys) was the island’s lone representative at the United States Girls Wrestling Association (USGWA) Alaska Girls Wrestling State Tournament in Sitka last weekend.
Canete, who wrestled in the 112-pound weight class this past season for the Bears, had dropped to the 105-pound division for the tournament, but came back up to the round robin 110-class due to a lack of competitors in the lighter bracket. She won her first match over Katie Conner of Homer 14-4, who had pinned her earlier in the season, then Canete beat her by two in their second meeting.
This advanced her to a showdown with Wasilla’s Ashlee Parker, who also had pinned Canete in a previous encounter this season. Although she didn’t win, Canete came just one point short.
In the words of Kodiak High head wrestling coach Pat Costello, who accompanied Canete on the trip, “She hit an outstanding arm drag to single leg, followed all the correct procedures, but when going to finish the move made a small mistake and lost the takedown and the match.”
In her final match, Canete went up against Tera Sabitionous-Murray of Colony, impressing not only Costello but Chugiak head coach Tom Huffer. She won that match as well, securing second place.
Canete became the third Kodiak wrestler to place top two in state this year.
She only started wrestling a few years ago in the eighth grade. After watching her cousin Brandon’s practices and impressed by the demanding workouts involved, she decided to try it herself. Canete said she also enjoys basketball, but the schedules created conflicts for doing both, so she stuck with the blood and sweat of the mat room.
The tournament was part of the USGWA (www.usgwa.com), an organization committed to female wrestling from elementary school through and beyond college. April 1 and 2 will be the ninth USGWA National Championships in Lake Orion, Mich. In 2005, 622 girls participated in this event. The Sitka meet had about 60 girls by Costello’s estimate, 30 to 35 in the seven-weight class high school division. Wasilla High sent a meet-high eight girls and a pair of coaches to the southeastern town.
USGWA director Kent Bailo estimates there are 4,000 to 5,000 girl wrestlers in the United States, with about half in Texas where, like in Hawaii, it is an athletic association sanctioned sport. Six colleges currently offer women’s wrestling including Pacific University in Forest Grove, Ore.
Bailo states girls’ wrestling is the fastest growing high school sport for females in the nation. Costello pointed out that about 13 years ago girl wrestling got its start but fizzled, but now has some new momentum behind it towards school and social acceptance. He added Kodiak would be interested to host an event such as Sitka just had in the next couple years.
But the trip to Sitka was far more than just a wrestling tournament. Canete met and even sparred with Olympic wrestlers Tela O’Donnell and Sara McMann. O’Donnell hails from Homer and McMann was a silver medallist in the 2004 Games in Athens. According to Costello, Canete was the only girl to take advantage of the one-on-one opportunity to work with world-class wrestlers and gain valuable advice from two of the best. In a telephone interview, Canete explained at length how she learned from McMann to improve her bottom positioning on starts.
On the way to Sitka, Canete had the chance to hang out with another top grappler, the 2006 Alaska State Champion at 103 pounds and fellow 10th-grader Michaela Hutchison of Skyview High. Hutchison is ranked No. 2 in the country in female high school wrestling and is the only female to ever beat all the boys and win a high school state championship. Chugiak’s Melissa Apodaca is ranked fourth nationally in the 130-pound class.
The girls visited a petting zoo and a chocolate factory as part of a tour, as well as taking in the history of the area. The educational benefits of the trip included a whale-watching voyage and a stop at a rehabilitation facility for birds of prey called the Raptor Center.
“I liked it a lot,” Canete said. “It’s a lot like Kodiak but warmer. It was about 50 degrees.”
Michelle is the daughter of Raul and Natividad Canete. Raul was a Kodiak High School track star in the mid-1980s.
Canete and KHS teammate Jimmy Eggemeyer have another chance to compete this year, at the Arctic Winter Games in Kenai next month. Like the trip to Sitka, their efforts are not part of the regular school athletic budget and are funded independently. If you would like to make a contribution toward their travel expenses, please contact coach Pat Costello, 486-2099, or e-mail alaskanpat@hotmail.com.
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Coaches: An upset or two could be difference at state
Dennis Barnidge and Laura Villmer
Of the Suburban Journals
Jefferson County Journal 02/15/2006
The Class 4 district finals at Lindbergh opened with one of the tournament's featured matches.
Ashley Hudson, perhaps the best female wrestler in the state, had pulled off an upset and won a spot in the 103-pound title match. Opposite her was the tournament's top seed, Fox freshman Zack Meury.
The test was a first for Meury. This was his first district tournament. It also was his first time on the mats with a girl as an opponent.
Meury tried to put the "girl" part of girl wrestler out of his mind.
"I treated her like a boy, just like any other wrestler," he said.
The freshman got a jump on Hudson and led the entire match, winning a 9-4 decision against the Lafayette junior.
*** *** ***
A female wrestler did win the 103-pound division at the Class 2 district at St. Clair. St. Clair freshman Randi Beltz scored a 6-0 decision against Sullivan's Brandon Rose. Beltz matched up with De Soto's Kayla Hunter in the first round of the tournament last Friday, pinning Hunter in 28 seconds. Beltz now has a 29-4 record.
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Three Raider girls to wrestle in Tacoma
02/15/2006
In addition to the 10 Raider boys traveling to Tacoma this week, three Raider girls are heading to the dome to take part in the Third Annual Girls Invitational Wrestling at Mat Classic, a forerunner to a full-blown girls' state wrestling event.
Representing Lake Roosevelt are Krystal Green, at 103 pounds; Ann Thomas, who placed second last year, at 119; and Teresa Deppman at 130.
Girl wrestlers who compete on school teams have traditionally been invited to the Mat Classic. Next year, what are now the girls' exhibition matches at Mat Classic turns into a full-scale state tournament.
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Tucson, Arizona | Published: 02.16.2006
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by Tyler Hemstreet/of The Herald 2/15/06
Don’t be fooled by her tightly braided blond hair neatly held in place with yellow and purple mini rubber bands — Puyallup senior wrestler Whitney Conder is all business when she hits the mat.
Last year, Conder became the first female wrestler in the state to place in the state tournament when she finished sixth in the 103-pound weight class. After winning the 103-pound weight class at this past weekend’s South Puget Sound League South Division Tournament, Condor is poised to improve on last year’s state finish.
“Last year it was an achievement just to get to there,” Conder says. “I want to finish higher [at state] this year, but I know there’s no easy road to anything.”
Conder, who has been wrestling since she was eight, has hit that road with the throttle wide open. Coming into the tournament, Condor’s record stood at 24-5 and she is currently among the top-ranked wrestlers in her weight class. She is constantly working to get better.
“She’s basically been on the mat year-round,” Puyallup wrestling coach Brian Bartelson says. “She’s wrestled in numerous camps and with other [club] teams in the off-season — all the areas of her wrestling have improved.”
Conder says she’s been able to learn from her mistakes.
“I know that I have to shoot more and be more aggressive in the ring,” she says.
Conder’s passion and dedication to the sport has earned her a team captain status and quite the reputation with her fellow wrestlers. Rogers wrestling coach David Johnston says Conder’s best attribute is her strong mental preparation for each match.
“She’s strong on her feet, strong on the mat, and when you throw in her mental strength — it makes for a pretty good combination,” Johnston says.
Condor defeated fellow Viking David Morrow in the 103-pound final to win the league championship. It was yet another match rooted in respect between the two teammates. Morrow and Condor routinely wrestle each other in practice and the sophomore says he’s often in awe of how hard she works.
“She puts a lot of time into what she does,” he says. “She’s just really good — she does everything right. She’s taught me a lot as a person and a wrestler.”
Through it all, the fact that Conder is a female competing in a predominantly male sport usually takes a backseat to her skills on the mat.
“It’s not really a big deal around here because everyone knows her,” Bartelson says. “As a wrestler, she’s legit — gender isn’t a factor.”
But as Conder works her way toward the state tournament and wrestles against opponents that aren’t familiar with her, gender may become a bigger issue — sheerly because there aren’t many girls wrestling at the state level. Conder doesn’t want to be looked at as a trailblazer for other girls trying to break into the sport — just a competitor.
“I don’t think of myself as anything but a wrestler,” Conder says.
Bartelson happily disagrees.
“What she’s doing is good for the sport,” he says. “Anything to get more people into the sport is a good thing. She’s a maverick. My 8- and 9-year-old girls admire her.”
Chance To Make History
If Whitney Conder wins a state wrestling title, she will become just the second girl in the nation to accomplish the feat. This past weekend, 103-pound sophomore wrestler Michaela Hutchison of Skyview High School in Alaska won a 1-0 decision over Colony’s Aaron Boss, becoming the first girl in U.S. history to win a state wrestling championship while competing against boys. If Conder wins, she will become the first female wrestler in the state to do so.
According to the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association, Conder, Leilani Akiyama from Newport High School and Meagan Martin of Willapa Valley are the only other female wrestlers in the state who have competed at the state tournament.
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Sauer no longer a novelty wrestler
By Neil H. Devlin 2/16/06
Denver Post Staff Writer
Golden - Daddy's little girl?
Of course, Golden High School's Brooke Sauer is all that and more.
The senior has a 3.27 grade-point average, is student body president and is a mentor in a program that addresses violence at school. She captained the volleyball team in the fall. And, if you must know, it's less likely she will offer something such as "Ooh, ick!" than, say, "Stick him!"
Why? Sauer is the first female wrestler to qualify for the Colorado wrestling tournament that begins today at the Pepsi Center.
No need to preface wrestler with the words girl or female when addressing her. It's cool she's the one, she said, but it won't help her tonight at 7:15, when she takes the mat like any other previous Colorado competitor in 71 years. Yet she will be the most different, novel and scrutinized - and it will grow if she progresses through the bracketing.
"It was my goal last year, too," said Sauer, a senior. "It was to be a wrestler who got to state. I'm just like any other wrestler (who qualified). Being a girl was just a bonus."
And what a bonus it is for the daughter of Dave Sauer, the school's wrestling coach, who was a state qualifier for the Demons from 1975-77. The younger Sauer, who is simply doing what she chooses and loves, has managed to cause quite a stir at the largest annual gathering on the prep calendar, one exclusively dominated by tough guys who now have to make way and move over for the charter member of the female qualifiers club.
A 5-foot-2, 103-pounder, Sauer advanced through consolation rounds in the past weekend's regional rounds in Grand Junction and, yes, it was as sweet as you can imagine.
"I would have been happy if any girl had made it," Dave Sauer said. "As long as they were in it for the right reasons, I would have been happy. But because it's (Brooke), it's special."
Consider some of the annual emotions, antics and sights of the tournament. Victory. Defeat. Pins. Technical falls. Superior decisions. Overtime. Referee's decision. Shaking hands. Injury. Blood on the mat. Having your arm raised after winning. Ending the season on a positive or negative note. Competing. Making weight. Marching in with the parade of champions. Being introduced. Jubilation. Dejection. Joining five others on the podium as placers. Performing in front of family, fans and maybe more than 17,000 people on finals night.
Brooke Sauer not only has the opportunity to join the fun, but has modified it already with the possibility of it getting better.
For instance, having been one of the few in-state schoolgirls to win a wrestling match against a schoolboy, is there a move to freeze out Sauer? Or is she being treated like the NFL's Green Bay Packers in the first Super Bowl, as in don't lose to Kansas City of the old AFL or all is lost? She can't win a state match, too, can she?
There's the fragile male ego thing. What young man, previously worried about losing to a girl in the first place, wants to say he was eliminated from the tournament by a - gulp! - girl?
Sauer, who said she struggles to make weight just as boys do, is well-versed and experienced in "the gender thing," according to her father.
There have been minor incidents, subtle ones, too, such as grudgingly acknowledging her accomplishments, but nothing that has made her blink.
She has furthered the notion that wrestling is for everybody who wants to pay the price. Sauer is well beyond sideshow, with the numbers to back it up. She was 4-20 as a sophomore, 19-21 as a junior. This season, Sauer is 26-12. Never mind she's a lightweight who owns more victories than only four others in her 16-person bracket.
Most qualifiers for the wrestling tournament don't get there by luck.
"It has been at every end of the spectrum, everything from being respected to the exact opposite; they could care less or say that I don't belong out there," Sauer said. "For the most part, the guys, win or lose, it doesn't matter. I've earned their respect as a wrestler, not someone trying to make a statement."
Sauer, who accompanied her father to countless practices as a youth, picked it up in middle school and stayed with it, is guaranteed two matches. She'll open against Pueblo South's Jeremy Aguero in a field devoid of placers from 2005.
As is the usual case for 103, there are five freshmen and four sophomores. She is the only senior.
A victory tonight would put her in Friday afternoon's quarterfinals; a loss sends her to the consolation rounds. In her wildest dreams, she would make the semifinals Friday night, then march in with 111 other finalists Saturday night.
Stranger things have happened.
"It's another tournament," Sauer said. "Before, I would have been happy to make it to state, but it's not really enough anymore. I don't want to go two and out. I want to prove I earned my spot."
An aspiring health sciences student who also wrestles competitively in the offseason and can bench press her body weight, Sauer wouldn't mind joining Michaela Hutchison of Alaska, who earlier this month became the nation's only girls wrestling state champion in a sport dominated by boys.
Sauer has applied to Colorado State, but doesn't know if wrestling will remain in her long-term future.
Remember: Her being here isn't a victory for females everywhere. She's doing something she loves.
"I'll definitely do the offseason freestyle this summer," she said. "But I really don't know ... I've been playing with the idea of going to the Olympic Training Center. I'm kind of open right now.
"I'd be able to live without it."
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Cincinnati.Com › communitypress.com › 2/16/06
James Weber/community Recorder Staff
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