BRADENTON - Just picture a python on the verge of attacking its prey. It moves slowly around its target for a few minutes, slightly improving its position with each slither of the coil.
The python feels out its victim and plans its first strike before the target even knows what hit it.
This is Mikala Furry on the wrestling mat. Fearless. Unwavering. Ferocious.
The freshman at Braden River High has cut across age limits and gender lines in her first year on the Pirates' varsity wrestling squad. The 14-year-old has compiled a 2-2 record -- all against boys -- so far this season and has dominated at her own age level, going 16-3 in JV matches. Her JV record against boys is 14-3.
Furry is the first female to ever wrestle at Braden River and fifth-year coach Dane Trask is excited about the youngster's potential.
"Technique-wise, she is far ahead than any freshman I've ever had," Trask said. "She has a good ground game, and she's moving all the time when she's on the mat. Mikala is improving every day, and she could definitely be a team leader in the future."
Furry recently won the JV Ram Invitational at Riverview High with five straight victories. As a second-grader, Furry began wrestling at a youth club in Michigan, and her parents approached Trask at the Braden River fall sports orientation about having her try out for the team.
"It's easy to forget that she is still a freshman. We don't expect her to win every varsity match, but to compete and keep it close ... and she does that," Trask said. "She learns from every match and I look to see a lot more from her in the years to come."
Since then, Furry has defeated other girls following in the same footsteps. She pinned a 125-pound opponent at the Riverview tournament and has only been pinned once this season.
"She has brought a lot to the team," Trask said. "She wants us to treat her as one of the guys, and she fits in well. The other guys like wrestling with her. It's not as rare as it used to be to see a woman doing this."
Furry also has made it easier for her teammates to prepare for when they have to wrestle a girl from another team.
"Wrestling with a girl has been uncomfortable for some of my guys in the past, but with Mikala we no longer have that issue," Trask said.
Boys on the Susquenita School District's wrestling teams can once again compete against girls on other teams.
Less than two years after its approval, the school board reversed its policy forbidding boys from wrestling against girls, by a 6 to 2 vote.
The policy does not apply to other contact sports such as football, district officials said.
The board left in place a provision that forbids girls and boys from competing together on the same teams.
Varsity wrestling coach Rusty Wallace Sr. told the board it was only a matter of time until the policy cost the team a match, because a Susquenita wrestler would be required to forfeit.
He said his son, who coaches at Northern Lebanon High School, jokes with him about having girls who wrestle and asking where they can weigh in before a match.
"They didn't," Wallace said. "But if they did, we might have lost the match."
Superintendent Daniel Sheats said the decision is now up to the individual wrestler, and he wondered what would happen if an athlete refused to wrestle a girl or competed and lost.
"Young people have to make these decisions," he said. "But sometimes they are put in a no-win situation."
{Jeff Mankie/News & Messenger}
Forest Park senior Kayla Bartosch is heading to King College, a Division II school in Tennessee, to continue wrestling. She began the sport in sixth grade after doing ballet.
Her chance of winning was slim. The match was winding down and Kayla Bartosch needed five points to tie Hylton’s Phillip Clarke and send the contest to overtime.
Time ran out and Bartosch, then a sophomore for Forest Park’s wrestling team, lost by a point.
But before the conclusion, Bartosch left an indelible mark on her coaches, teammates, fans and most important Clarke.
“She threw a nasty headlock and chucked the guy to his back,” Forest Park coach Seth Cameron said.
That move sent those watching into euphoria.
“I know people were going nuts,” Cameron said. “The crowd was cheering. Our team was cheering. I remember seeing the fear in his face just because he was wrestling a sophomore girl and he was one of their studs. She took everything out of him. She was very close to upsetting him and winning that match.”
What’s more, she sparked the Bruins to a dual match victory.
“That kind of put some fire in us after that,” Cameron said.
Two years later, Bartosch still applies her moves on the mat. The lone female on Forest Park’s wrestling team does so in the 125-pound weight class.
And she enjoys the experience.
“I started in sixth grade,” the former Graham Park Middle School wrestler said. “In sixth grade, I had no idea if I would keep going. By eighth grade, I was definitely on board. In high school, I really hoped I would get a scholarship. I hoped it would help me through college. I’m really glad it has.”
The senior will wrestle next season at King College in Bristol, Tennessee, an NCAA Division II provisional member. King College has an all-female wrestling team and Bartosch has been given a partial scholarship.
“She’s wrestled varsity matches for us ever since she was a freshman,” said Cameron, whose father Bill coached Bartosch’s father Paul when Paul wrestled at Potomac. “She started 15 times as a freshman and as a girl, that’s a great accomplishment. Kayla’s got a great gift.”
Her talent, though, once came out on the dance floor as she did nine years of ballet before wrestling.
But wrestling figured to be high on her priority list. She watched the sport and knew that if she’d do it, she’d continue if she liked it.
She just didn’t understand the challenge of getting to the right weight and the physical rigors that came with it.
Gradually, though, her passion began to develop thanks to a match which enhanced her confidence.
In sixth grade, Bartosch wrestled a girl two years older.
“Automatically, I was like, ‘This isn’t going to be too good. She knows more than me,’” Bartosch said.
She overestimated her opponent. Bartosch admits she was not technically sound, but she won by scoring more points.
That victory motivated her to improve. Since then, Bartosch has wrestled two years for the Quantico Wrestling Club and for the Northern Virginia Wrestling League. She became an All-American by placing fifth in an all-female U.S. wrestling national championships last spring in Oklahoma.
Bartosch has practiced her moves with younger brothers, one of whom served as her practice partner for three years.
“She’s been somebody that’s wanted to learn,” Paul said. “She takes that to all parts of her life. She’s always been very open and wanted to study.”
She has also been mentally tough. When wrestling in middle school, male wrestlers and coaches took turns questioning Bartosch’s ability.
“They’d tell the wrestler to make it quick,” Bartosch said. “That I won’t be out there that long. That she’s a girl. You need to be tougher than her.”
Bartosch silenced the talk. She pinned one male wrestler after he and his father mocked her during her preparation for the match.
In high school, Bartosch has further silenced criticism by being very precise in executing her moves. She does so against the teammates she practices with and guys from other teams whom she competes against.
Bartosch knows she surrenders a physical advantage when wrestling, but lets her instincts dictate the course of a match.
“I’ve been trying to work, not on my aggression in the match, but scoring first and pushing the action, not letting them take advantage,” she said.
Of course, she can be aggressive if need be.
Staff writer Robert Daski can be reached at 703-878-8049.
========================================================================================SARATOGA SPRINGS
Fully healthy for the first time in a year and a half, Sarah Anderson seems to be making up for lost time.
The Schuylerville senior - one of a small number of female wrestlers in Section II - is still undefeated at 20-0 at 112 pounds this season heading into Tuesday night's dual meet at Salem.
A torn labrum in her shoulder forced her to miss almost all of the 2008-09 season, after she had made back-to-back trips to the state meet as a ninth- and 10th-grader.
Anderson was injured while practicing for an offseason tournament in the spring of 2008. She tried to make a comeback midway through the season, enough to pick up her 100th career victory, but ended up shutting down for the rest of the year.
"Last year killed me not being on the mat," Anderson said during a break Saturday at the Saratoga Invitational. "I never had an injury as serious as that one. That was tough to get over. I wanted to come back too soon, then it took longer to heal."
"We pulled her out last year because she was not 100 percent," said her father, Schuylerville assistant coach Buck Anderson. "It took 14-16 months before she was really ready, working hard at the barn."
Sarah Anderson said strengthening the shoulder muscles around the injury site was the key to her healing process.
"The doctors and physical therapists told me to attack the center of (the injury), but it wasn't getting any better," she said. "My father said I had to make my shoulder strong enough to build it back up. We attacked the muscles around it."
The process worked and Anderson was drilling again by fall.
"At first I did a little drilling, then a little bit of live wrestling, then we went to a preseason tournament in Connecticut," she said. "There was no pain, it felt great. I was so happy to be back."
Anderson finished third at that preseason tournament, and has carried that success into her senior season. She was lightweight Most Outstanding Wrestler at the Glens Falls MatMania tournament, and won the Saratoga Invitational.
Now wrestling at 112, instead of 96 or 103, Anderson faces a stronger pool of male wrestlers, but is hopeful for a third run at the state meet.
"I'm just taking it match-by-match," she said.
Anderson is looking at a few colleges that offer women's wrestling scholarships, including Oklahoma City University, Lock Haven (Pa.) and King College in Bristol, Tenn.
"There's starting to be quite a few colleges offering women's wrestling," she said.
"Things happen for a reason," Buck Anderson said. "I think it made her more hungry. It made her understand what she needed to do to come back."
Sports writer Pete Tobey may be reached at tobey@poststar.com.
Jackie Stiles 
Injuries have derailed Jackie Stiles collegiate wrestling career since winning the 105-pound national collegiate title as a freshman in 2007. |
CORPUS CHRISTI — Jackie Stiles tried her best to believe it wasn’t happening again. But the physical pain and disappointment were too severe to ignore.
Last week, while attending workouts with other top wrestlers at the United States Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo., Stiles dislocated her left elbow. The injury dashed her hopes of capturing another national title for the University of the Cumberlands and marked the end to a bittersweet collegiate career.
“The thought going through my head when it happened was, ‘Now what am I going to do?’ “ Stiles said.
Stiles, a former standout wrestler at Ray High School, has been plagued with injuries ever since winning the 105-pound national collegiate title as a freshman in 2007. A similar elbow injury prevented her from competing in the 2008 nationals and a knee injury slowed her down last year.
Stiles was determined to end her career at the University of Cumberlands with a trip to the nationals on Jan. 29 and 30 in Marshall, Mo., and a title in the 121-pound division.
“I was kind of shocked that this would happen right now,” Stiles said. “I figured this year I would train hard and take a national title.”
“She was working with one of the top girls here in the U.S. and popped her elbow out,” Cumberlands head coach Kip Flanik said. “It’s real tough for us. We’re in a (team) title hunt.”
Flanik first saw Stiles compete at the 2005-06 UIL state tournament in Austin. Stiles went from a freshman at Ray who didn’t know a single wrestling move to one of the best wrestlers in the state by the time she was a senior.
“My older brother was a wrestler at Ray,” Stiles said. “I was into basketball and softball. He asked me if I wanted to go practice and my grandmother pushed me to go to practice with him. I went and got beat up. There were some good girls there that year and they put a whooping on me. The next day, I was back there to learn whatever I could to get back at them.”
Stiles, who was raised by her grandparents, stayed with wrestling and won district titles in her weight division and earned a berth to the state tournament. But she expected her wrestling career would go no farther than the high school level.
“I had a really bad state tournament,” Stiles said. “Coach Flanik just saw something in me. He came up to talk to me afterward and I really didn’t want to talk to him because I was upset with how my tournament ended up. I was surprised he still wanted to talk to me. Never at all did I think I would go to college and wrestle.”
“Her coach and her grandmother were so adamant about how much they loved her that it encouraged me to take a chance on her,” Flanik said.
It didn’t take long for Flanik to realize that he made a good decision as Stiles dominated her weight class as a freshman en route to the national title.
“Even as a freshman, she was one of the better wrestlers I’ve ever had,” Flanik said. “Her attitude was she going to go so far from home that she may as well make it count for something.”
Stiles made the United States Pan-Am Games team and returned home with a bronze medal.
“She can be friends with anybody,” Flanik said. “But when she’s wrestling you, she hates you. I wish I had a hundred other girls like that.”
Stiles, the first member of her family to attend college, will graduate in May with a double major in public health and exercise sports science. She was scheduled to undergo an MRI this week to determine how long she will be sidelined.
“If anything is torn, it will be six months or more,” said Stiles, who is hoping to return to the mat in two months and begin training for the Senior Nationals and a spot on the U.S. World Championships team. “It hurts alot. But knowing I can be back in a couple of months makes me excited.”
Stiles’ ultimate goal is to earn a berth on the U.S. Olympic team for the 2012 Games in London. She said the obstacles she has had to overcome have only sharpened her focus on becoming an Olympian.
“You are always learning something new in this sport,” she said. “That’s what I like. I’m 100-percent sure that I will come back within the next few months. I will compete in world competitions. I have always had the dream of making the Olympic team. This is just another step back for me.”
=========================================================================================By: David Selvig, The Jamestown Sun 10/12/10
 Misha Furness |
A long layoff and a banged up roster couldn’t keep the Jamestown College women’s wrestling team from a strong showing at the invitation only NWCA National Duals.
The Jimmies went 2-1 in their matches to place third in the 12-team field, consisting of the top teams in women’s wrestling. The Jimmies defeated Lindenwood 28-16 in the opening round and Missouri Valley 24-13 in the third-place match on Sunday.
“The girls were excited. They wrestled well. It was a really good weekend for them,” coach Cisco Cole said. “We were facing quality competition so for them to come through like they did was great to see.”
The Jimmies had not competed since late November at the Huskie Open in Saskatchewan. They were also without a handful of their main wrestlers, including defending national champion Tani Ader, who is redshirting this season with a bum shoulder.
The Jimmies went 2-1 in the tournament held in Cedar Falls, Iowa, despite having to forfeit at 48 and 51 kilograms in each of their three duals.
“It’s been a tough year injury-wise,” Cole said. “The one thing that’s come out of it is that we’ve had some other girls step up and show us some good things.”
Cole was particularly pleased with Michelle Quiles and Misha Furniss.
Quiles, a sophomore from Silver Creek, N.Y., went 2-0 in her contested matches and 3-0 overall. She had the lone victory in the Jimmies’ 31-11 semifinal loss to Canadian powerhouse Simon Fraser.
Furniss, the lone junior on the JC roster, went 2-1, including a key pin in the Jimmies’ 24-11 victory over Missouri Valley in the third-place match.
“Those two girls really wrestled well for us,” Cole said. “The pin Misha got against Missouri Valley was certainly big.”
Nicole Yarrington (44), Tiffany Sluik (55), Kayla Volin (72) and Jami Moore (82) all went 2-1. Calie Cutler and Amanda Athon also contributed. Cutler won her 67-kilo match against Lindenwood, while Athon notched a fall in her 95-kilo tilt against Missouri Valley.
“I thought the girls represented Jamestown College in a very positive way,” Cole said. “It was a good weekend for us.”
The Jimmies finish their season with a dual on the road against the University of Regina on Jan. 20 before the NAIA National Tournament in Marshal, Mo. on Jan. 30
Sun sports writer Dave Selvig can be reached at (701) 952-8460 or by e-mail at daves@jamestownsun.com
=======================================================================================CLAN Wrestling: SFU men 2-1, women 1-1 at Menlo Duals
January 4, 2010
Atherton, CA – Competing over the weekend at the Menlo Duals, hosted by Menlo College, the Simon Fraser University Clan men’s wrestling team finished with a 2-1 dual record, while the women’s team finished 1-1.
On the women’s side, the Clan finished 1-1, defeating Menlo 31-7, while falling to Oklahoma City 28-13. Michiko Araki (44 kg), Victoria Anthony (48 kg), Laura Wilson (55 kg), Raissa Dickinson (59 kg), Danielle Lappage (63 kg), Taylor Dick (72 kg) and Hilary Greening (95 kg) were all victorious against Menlo.