Girls Wrestlers Help Contribute to the Growth Within the Sport

Halle VanCuren

On the mat, freshman Olivia Gibson wrestles her male opponent.

Nationwide, wrestling has been one of the fastest-growing sports for high school girls for a number of years. According to the National Wrestling Coaches Association, since 1994, the number of high school girls who wrestle has gone from 804 to over 31,654.

For Logansport High School, the number of female wrestlers has also increased in recent years. However, wrestling is still a coed sport. 

“At this time, the Logansport wrestling team is still run as a coed program,” wrestling coach Sam Fry said. “The girls practice with the boys and are expected to complete the same workouts and level of intensity as the boys. In our room, we have no girls or boys, just wrestlers.”

According to Fry, this wrestling season, four girls joined the team.

“Two of them have wrestled for multiple years now, and two started the season off as managers and then decided to try it out themselves,” Fry said. “Olivia Gibson and Marcy Zagal have been able to make the varsity roster, filling in weight classes. Out of the two first-year wrestlers, Lian Kim has made it through the entire season and has greatly improved over the year. Our other first-year wrestler did not finish the season.”

Junior Marcy Zagal has been wrestling since her seventh-grade year. 

“I have wrestled every other year, but I do plan on joining again next year,” Zagal said.

Zagal’s initial reason for joining wrestling was not just because she wanted to join, but because she wanted to prove she was actually capable of wrestling.

“I had a friend in seventh grade who comes from a family of wrestlers,” Zagal said. “He told me specifically that I was not capable of wrestling. He didn’t think I could join, and I started off wanting to prove him wrong, but I ended up falling in love with the sport. I was not worried about coed at all. The guys in middle school were very welcoming and still are.”

Another female wrestler at LHS is freshman Olivia Gibson. Gibson has been wrestling since her sixth-grade year. 

“My dad told me I should join and see if I like it,” Gibson said. “He did warn me from the beginning that it would be more likely versus boys than girls. Though, I wasn’t worried one bit. It was just boys, no big deal.”

Although mentally coed wrestling may seem like no big deal, genetically it can be a bit of a challenge. 

“Wrestling has been coed for as long as I have been involved as a wrestler back in 2002 and even before that,” Fry said. “In recent years, more and more girls have been coming out to join wrestling. We recognize the genetic difference between boys and girls. At the youth and middle school level, girls can be fairly competitive against boys. But after puberty fully hits and boys develop greater muscle mass, it really becomes unfair for girls to wrestle a boy in the same weight class.”

For girls wrestling, it is very challenging to make it far just due to different anatomy. However, it is not impossible. 

“For a girl to be competitive at the varsity level, they had to be almost world-class level athletes,” Fry said. “To my knowledge, only three girls have ever qualified for the state tournament in the history of Indiana wrestling. The first one to do it, Kayla Miracle, is an Olympic finalist and a two-time world champion now for USA wrestling.”

Although it can be challenging due to boys having greater muscle mass, girls do have an advantage as well. 

“There are no differences when it comes to rules or how the matches work,” Fry said. “Girls’ anatomy does come into play from time to time as the girls tend to be more flexible, allowing them to be in some positions our male wrestlers can’t get into.”

Fry continues to explain that despite different anatomy, technique is very important for both boys and girls. 

“Girls also tend to have lower upper body strength compared to a boy of the same size,” Fry said. “So, some of the moves need to be tweaked slightly to fit their style. But, for both boys and girls, technique is king in wrestling. Being strong helps, but if you aren’t doing the move right, you will fail when you get up against an opponent who knows what they are doing.”

However, due to not having enough female wrestlers, there has been no other option than for them to compete against their male counterparts. 

“In the past, there haven’t been enough girls coming out to wrestle to need a girls wrestling tournament,” Fry said. “In an entire season, you might run across one or two girls across the 40 to 50 schools you saw during the season. But, in the last few years, girls wrestling has become the fastest-growing sport in the nation, and we are starting to find schools with enough girls to field a full team.”

With the recent growth throughout Indiana, the Indiana High School Wrestling Coaches Association runs a state tournament, but it is not officially recognized by the IHSAA.

“It runs similar to the coed series, but it is running into issues as they did not expect the number of girls to grow as fast as it has,” Fry said. “Due to this, we went from two semi-state locations last year to four this year. Next year, they will be adding another round to have eight regionals feeding into the four semi-states, and then to the state. So, as girls wrestling numbers increase, I believe we will get closer and closer to the two being run the same.”

On Jan. 6, 2023, regionals took place for girls wrestling.

“Olivia Gibson finished 3rd in the 113 weight class, and Marcy Zagal finished 4th in the 126 weight class at the girls regional tournament,” Fry said. “Both came one win away from qualifying for the girls state tournament.”

Due to priorly only wrestling coed, Gibson explains how much her experience at regionals meant to her.

“My experience at regionals was like no other,” Gibson said. “Just to see girls wrestling was insane. I did well getting third place in my bracket. I think doing tournaments and everything just like the boys, but for girls, will be a great opportunity for girls wrestling. The tournaments are definitely different from the boys. The way they bracket, they just kind of want to get it out of the way type thing, but maybe next year will be a huge change for girls wrestling.”

Even in just the past two years, girls wrestling has seen a big change.

“My freshman year, girls wrestling was so small,” Zagal said. “We only had semi-state and state, and it was held at Maconaquah High School. But, girls wrestling is officially a girls sport as of last year, and I think it is absolutely crazy. This year, they tried something new. They held a girls tournament at Lafayette. More than 400 girls showed up. The system crashed as they were not expecting so many. I am amazed to see how many girls are starting to join.”

Although Zagal performed well at the tournament, she did not have a good experience. 

“My personal experience at that regional tournament was horrible,” Zagal said. “I cried so, so much, not because I lost, but because I was starving. I cried for a Big Mac. But, in general, no, this was a very poorly executed tournament. It was basically two tournaments in one. I won every other match, but unfortunately, I did not make it to state. I believe we had two brackets in my weight class.”

Due to the increasing amount of participation at the girls tournaments this year, there was a lot of trial and error. 

“My friend, who wrestled at 113, wrestled 7 times,” Zagal said. “Legally, five to six is pushing it, and seven is not allowed. Girls regionals, as well, were already separated into four different schools. This year could have been completely different if we simply separated the two tournaments. They do plan on changing that next year to regionals, semi-state, and state.”

With a great increase in girls participating in wrestling, the Indiana High School Athletic Association has recently voted to add girls wrestling. 

“Due to laws like Title-9, the IHSAA did not recognize girls wrestling as a separate sport because if they recognize girls wrestling, they must have a boys sport to equal it out,” Frye said. “Now that there are enough girls to recognize it, the IHSAA will be adding boys volleyball to even it up, and it takes time to get all of that in place from a legal standpoint.”

In the next few years, girls wrestling will be separated from coed wrestling.

“It takes time to get all of that in place from a legal standpoint,” Fry said. “Right now, IHSAA is figuring out all the legal steps necessary to be in compliance with national anti-discrimination laws, such as Title 9, and determining what changes, if any, need to be made for a girls-only wrestling season. I see exciting things in the future of the sport. NCAA just added girls wrestling this last season. The Olympics just added women’s in the last Olympics, and we will see it continue to grow in the future.”

Although something like this takes time to put into place, there is a lot of hope as girls wrestling evolves.

“We are getting there,” Zagal said. “Girls are starting to get recognized and very quickly. My sister is a seventh-grade wrestler, and I’m confident by the time she gets to high school, there will be so many more opportunities.”