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'Males only' goes down for the count
By Delton Lowery
SPECIAL TO THE UNION-TRIBUNE
March 8, 2002
Teresa Coffey, serving in the Navy as an electrical technician, phoned her husband, Joaquin, from Bali in November 1993.
Teresa was in the middle of a six-month cruise in the Western Pacific and wanted to know how her other half was doing.
That's when he told her he had taken their two oldest daughters, 9-year-old Tabitha and 7-year-old Megan, to a Montgomery Junior Aztecs wrestling practice.
"I can't even begin to tell you," Teresa said of her reaction. "I was not real happy. Let's just put it that way.
"I have girls, and this is a boys sport."
She has since changed her opinion, and so have several others.
The "males-only" stereotype is rapidly changing as the prospect of females donning wrestling singlets and hitting the mat catches on. There is already a national governing body, the U.S. Girls Wrestling Association.
In addition to wrestling on boys teams, more girls are taking part in all-female competition like the third annual California girls state championships tomorrow at Crawford High.
Joaquin Coffey, also an electrical technician in the Navy, is in his first year as wrestling coach at Montgomery High. With Tabitha on the team, he guided the Aztecs to this year's Mesa League title.
Tabitha, a senior, will be one of the favorites in the 100-pound weight class tomorrow. USGWA.com lists her at No. 4 in the nation, just behind junior Maika Watanabe of Vintage High in Napa.
The two faced off at last year's nationals. Watanabe was victorious and took fifth place. Tabitha finished seventh.
"I was disappointed with how I wrestled her," Tabitha said. "I'm looking forward to wrestling her again. I'll be more aggressive."
Her parents credit wrestling with giving Tabitha that type of fire.
"She's determined to do things with wrestling," said her father, a former Arizona high school state champ.
"She had a learning disability when she was young. Wrestling brought her out of her shell and helped her with her confidence."
Tabitha, who has won three state freestyle championships as a youth, became only the second girl in CIF-San Diego Section history to advance to the Masters Tournament last month.
Academically, she has earned a 3.94 grade-point average and hopes to be a teacher. San Diego State will give her a chance to pursue that aspiration. Tabitha received her acceptance letter Tuesday.
"That's the school I wanted to go to the most," she said. "It has a good teaching program."
The Aztecs also have a women's wrestling club team, with the hope of someday becoming a sanctioned sport.
Maybe that will be in time for 12-year-old Sabrina Coffey, the youngest sibling, who took third nationally at 55 pounds in the elementary school division last year. She will compete at the 82-pound class in the middle-school division tomorrow.
Then the Coffey family heads for Lake Orion, Mich., to take part in the fifth annual USGWA national championships March 23-24.
Union-Tribune
Tabitha Coffey
IIn addition to wrestling on boys teams, more girls are taking part in
all-female competition like the third annual California girls state
championships tomorrow at Crawford High.
Tabitha Coffey, a senior at Montgomery High, will be one of the
favorites in the 100-pound weight class tomorrow. USGWA.com lists her at No. 4 in
the nation, just behind junior Maika Watanabe of Vintage High in Napa.
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Girls drawn to the mat
S.J. wrestler among growing ranks in once-male sport
By Jessica Portner
Mercury News 3/5/02
Renee Green, the sole girl on Silver Creek High School's wrestling team, is accustomed to putting boys in their place: The 130-pound powerhouse pins male competitors in bout after bout, and is among the top-ranked female wrestlers in the state.
Girls like Renee are knocking the formerly boys-only sport off balance.
Their numbers are small but rising as schools throughout the nation recruit female wrestlers in anticipation of the 2004 Olympics, when female athletes will compete on the mats for the first time.
Many cheer the increasing popularity of girls' wrestling as a victory for women in a male-dominated arena. The roster of girls wrestling on high school teams nationally has swelled quietly from 100 to 4,000 in the past decade, and coaches estimate that about 200 girls wrestle on teams in the Bay Area.
But because so few girls compete in high school, all-girl squads are rare, and female wrestlers frequently must tangle with boys on their teams. Some coaches and parents worry, however, that such close physical contact between the sexes can lead to unwanted advances and can be physically hazardous to girls.
In her three years on San Jose's Silver Creek squad, Renee, 17, has endured a litany of pain: a sprained wrist, jammed fingers and an injured elbow. She's sacrificed dating time to work out every day and has starved herself with strict diets of noodles and fruit to keep within the weight limits of her class.
Last year, she contracted ringworm, a skin disease spread by person-to-person contact, at practice. But she's had to confront more than nasty dermatological afflictions on the mat. Prejudice, she said, is rampant.
``Some boys say they don't want to wrestle a girl because their egos get hurt,'' Renee said, or they'll forfeit a match rather than compete with her.
Jimmy Hughes, a Silver Creek coach, said many boys see wrestling a girl as a losing proposition.
``It's a no-win situation for a guy,'' he said, ``If they beat the girl, they are already expected to win. If they lose, they've lost to a girl.''
Other local girls say they routinely suffer verbal jabs and worse from boys.
Amy Horowitz, a 160-pound wrestler at Westmont High School in Campbell, said one boy intentionally slammed her, breaking her collarbone during a competition. ``I'm constantly getting hit,'' she said.
In the locker room before a recent practice, Renee transformed herself from schoolgirl to formidable opponent. She shed her size 7 jeans, slipped into sweats and twisted her long brown tresses into a braid. Then she joined the ring of runners jogging around the gym.
When the coach signaled for practice to start, the players scattered across the floor with their partners. Renee was matched with Rudy Herrera, a lanky 16-year-old boy with spiked hair. At the whistle, she sprang forward, he jerked her down, and they both crashed onto the mat. The two rocked back and forth in a long tight hold until Renee finally thumped his shoulders flat on the ground.
``Ah, I gotcha,'' she said, smiling.
On the mat, even if her teammates seem like pals, the sexual tension is hard to miss. Wrestling moves often look more like a mating ritual than an athletic contest. Many are illegal: the knee lock, neck wrench and full nelson. And then there's the out-of-bounds crotch grab.
``A lot of guys are afraid of touching the wrong spot,'' said a sheepish Ronnie Lopez, one of Renee's teammates.
Rudy, her wrestling partner, agreed. ``At first it was awkward like I was afraid of doing some moves cause I'd have to put my face in her chest,'' he said. ``But now it's like wrestling anybody else.''
``Except,'' Renee said, ``I have boobs.''
While Renee's mother, Helen Perales, applauds her daughter's drive and talent, she admits to feeling queasy early on.
``At first we thought that the idea of girls and boys wrestling so close together was too hands on,'' Perales said. ``But none of that comes up at the matches. It's just about winning.''
Leticia Rico is not so sure. She won't let her son Joseph, one of the team's star wrestlers, practice with Renee.
``I'm against it,'' said Rico. ``Boys' hormones at this age are raging, Renee is a beautiful girl, and I don't think they are blind to that.''
Rico also sees coed wrestling as disrespectful to women. ``We teach boys to treat girls like ladies and then we let them pound girls' faces to the ground,'' she said.
Mary Joe Kane, a professor at the University of Minnesota's Center for Research on Girls and Women in Sport, said girls' wrestling long has been a trial for the male-dominated sports establishment because it upsets traditional gender stereotypes.
``Wrestling,'' she said, ``is about subduing one's opponent through force -- the antithesis of the definition of femininity.''
Still, Gary Abbott, who directs the women's program at the USA Wrestling Association, predicts women's wrestling will be a hot draw at the Athens Olympics in two years.
``Look at all the noise'' people made about the women's bobsled team at the Olympics, he said. ``That's what it's going to be like for wrestling in 2004.''
Abbott hopes enough girls eventually will be drawn to the sport that they can demand school teams of their own.
Currently, only Hawaii and Texas have separate high school wrestling teams for girls. In California, girls compete on coed teams but can choose to compete against boys or girls, who also have their own tournaments.
On the Silver Creek team, assistant wrestling coach Anthony Barajas said he would put Renee ``up against a guy any day.'' But if he had enough female athletes, he would form a separate team for girls.
``They'd get more one-on-one attention with less hormonal distractions,'' he said.
Renee, however, has no problem confronting boys on the mat.
``I want to let it be known,'' she said, ``that this sport is not just for guys.''
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Dressed in a wrestling singlet and pulling her hair up into a pony tail, wrestler Monica Berrelez gets ready in the girls locker room at Loveland high school before the meet starts.
Photo by Jenny Sparks
Greeley Tribune, Greeley, Colo.
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Girl Power
From the Journal Sentinel
Last Updated: Nov. 19, 2001
The WIAA does not have a separate program for girls wrestling, instead allowing girls to compete for spots on boys teams. But that hasn't stopped the United States Girls Wrestling Association from compiling its own set of national rankings.
Four Wisconsin entrants are on the most current list:
Black River Falls senior Megan Goldsmith, fifth at 165 pounds.
Darlington sophomore Nella Bernadoni, seventh at 100.
Oconomowoc junior Dawn Schneiderwent, seventh at 138.
Cudahy senior Kate Liegler, eighth at 105.
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The team won both the HISD District Tournament and the Region IV Tournament. Qualifying six girls and one alternate, the girls wrestled their way to a tenth place finish at the UIL State Tournament. The state qualifiers and their weight classes are: Linda Guerrera, 95; Cynthia Osueke, 102; Reem Al-Hellou, 110 (alternate); Amanda Noteware, 119; Iris Carizales, 138; Desiree Garrison, 185; and Juana Laurin, 215. This was every girl’s first year of wrestling and four of them are graduating this year. Expectations for next year’s team are high.
Two girls continued wrestling during the post-season. Competing in the USGWA Texas State Tournament, Desiree Garrison placed second, and Amanda Noteware earned the State Championship, even defeating the UIL State Champion. Noteware and Garrison both qualified for the USGWA National Tournament in Lake Orion, Michigan. Both girls competed and senior Amanda Noteware placed ninth in the 126 pound weight class, earning an All-American title. The salutatorian of her senior class, Noteware will attend Princeton University in the fall where she plans to continue wrestling.
During their second season, the boys wrestling team surpassed many odds and expectations. Qualifying 10 athletes for Region IV competition, the team placed second in the HISD District Tournament. David Vogt, 112 pounds, and James Washington, 119 pounds, both placed fifth and earned State Qualifier titles as alternates. James Washington competed in the UIL State Tournament but was eliminated during the second round.
Post season wrestling for the boy’s team has been exciting. At the NHSCA National Qualifier, four boys competed and all four qualified for the national tournament in Birmingham, Alabama this July. Jacob Austin, 130, Pablo Ramos, 160, and Jay Morgan, 215, all placed first, Austin defeating two wrestlers from nearby Westside High School. David Vogt placed second in the 119-weight class. At the Westside High School Tournament, Jacob Austin placed first in both Greco-Roman and Freestyle wrestling, and David Vogt place first his Freestyle wrestling bracket.
