High School Girls Wrestling on the Rise

Success in wrestling takes patience and a lot of hard work.

So it’s no coincidence growing the sport of girls wrestling at the high school level has taken patience—and a lot of hard work.

But it's continuing to pay off. Since January 2020, the Montana, Oklahoma, and South Dakota state high school athletic/activities associations have announced plans to sanction girls wrestling at the high school level, increasing the number of states with girls high school wrestling to 23. In April, The Alabama Girls High School Wrestling Task Force announced the launch of SanctionAL, a grassroots effort to work toward getting high school girls wrestling approved as a sanctioned sport in Alabama. In March The Pennsylvania Girls High School Wrestling Task Force announced the launch of SanctionPA to do the same in Pennsylvania.

The number of girls wrestling in high school has gone from 804 in 1994 to 21,124 as of 2019.

“Girls continue to take up the challenge,” says Joan Fulp, co-chair of the USA Wrestling Girls High School Development Committee. “They continue to wrestle in spite of the obstacles endured in finding their space on the mat. One by one they see the inspiration and character building traits once only enjoyed by boys and men. They want to drink from the same fountain.”

In January, the NCAA voted yes on Full Emerging Sport Status for Women’s Wrestling. Since then the University of the Ozarks (Arkansas), University of North Carolina Greensboro, Northern Michigan University, Aurora University (IL), Augustana College (IL), and St. Andrews University (NC) have all added intercollegiate wrestling programs. According to the National Wrestling Coaches Association, there are 70+ colleges that now sponsor a varsity wrestling program. 

“Women’s wrestling is growing worldwide,” says Fulp. “Opportunities are growing. Young girls and women in the United States should not have to sit back and watch their female counterparts benefit from participating in wrestling and not take part themselves. It is exciting to see administrators and state leaders acknowledge this growth by stepping up to the plate and providing all female competition and state championships.”

B. Elliot Hopkins, Director of Sports, Sanctioning and Student Services for the National Federation of State High School Associations, says the planning process for adding new sports, whether it’s girls wrestling, or others, is intentional and methodical.

“There has been a tremendous response to analyzing the possibilities for girls to represent their schools and another opportunity for them to compete at the high school level,” says Hopkins. “Girls typically do not want to wrestle boys, but they want to test themselves and appreciate the hard work, and camaraderie with other like-minded athletes. For any new program, a state association plans on how to present the students in the best light. You have to make sure that you have enough officials to cover the additional matches and coaches available to want to coach female wrestlers. You have to make sure there is enough competition available in your state. Each and every sport that a state takes on as a new opportunity is always to promote, educate, and showcase the high school student.”

Reshaping the Wrestling Landscape

Sally Roberts is Founder and CEO of Wrestle Like a Girl (WLAG), a nonprofit organization whose mission is to empower girls and women using the sport of wrestling to become leaders in life. Over the past four years alone, WLAG has raised over $1M dollars from donors and sponsors, which has been reinvested into the girls wrestling community, specifically targeting systematic policy change at the state and institutional levels.

“When we are investing our time, capacity, and financial resources, we want the outcome to reshape the landscape for the betterment of all wrestlers, particularly girls,” Roberts says. “Additionally, wrestling is among the most equitable sports; the common denominator is weight, but age, height, gender, skill level, ability and disability are wide ranging. The low cost of equipment and registration fees compared to other sports contribute to wrestling’s natural inclusiveness.”

Today, girls have more options than ever to participate in sports at the high school level, whether it be volleyball, soccer, basketball, hockey, lacrosse, softball, tennis, wrestling, and many more. According to the 2018–19 High School Athletics Participation Survey conducted by the NFHS, there are over 3.4 million girls participating in high school sports.

“Those other mentioned sports are great opportunities for girls,” says Hopkins. “However, wrestling is a sport of extreme discipline and allows an athlete to better understand their body and how it functions under stress. There are few sports that teach you balance, leverage, endurance, and total physical and mental connectiveness like wrestling. The sport is aggressive, challenging and is not for the faint of heart. It is some of the hardest six minutes that a person can experience. It hardens your will, builds determination, and prepares you for challenges in life. Wrestlers are tough, focused, resilient and have an extreme resolve. These characteristics are what we want our boys to have in order for them to be successful, why not have the same aspirations and expectations for our girls?”

Breaking Barriers

The fact that wrestling is a fit for girls of all skills, experiences, and sizes, is another reason why girls are gravitating to the sport. It’s not uncommon to hear stories of how boys wrestling coaches recruit athletes from other sports (football for example) to wrestle. High School coaches are also doing the same to help grow girls wrestling.

“With different weight classes we have the opportunity to invite girls into wrestling that are not being recruited for other sports because of their size, whether it’s the girl that weighs 98 pounds or 190 pounds,” says Andrea Yamamoto, co-chair of the USA Wrestling Girls High School Development Committee. “The very nature of weight classes advertises that this is a sport for every girl.”

High school coaches are doing a better job of recruiting, building teams and teaching skills to female students, says Yamamoto. In return, their female wrestlers become the best recruiters for the sport and we begin to see the natural expansion occur.

“We’re seeing that locally, statewide and nationwide,” Yamamoto says. “Girls high school wrestling is helping us expand our reach into school. Girls are elevating the visibility of our sport and reaching students that never would have given us a chance because their ideas of wrestling are supported by old negative stereotypes or a narrow idea of who participates. Girls are not just breaking down barriers in wrestling for female students, they are breaking down barriers that have prevented many from joining.”

As those barriers are broken, more opportunity is created.

“There has been a lack of opportunity for young girls to compete in combat sports within the scholastic experience, and for society to accept females wanting to participate in a tough, grueling sport like wrestling,” Fulp says. “We need to thank our early pioneers who, one by one, changed the hearts and minds of wrestling coaches and parents across the nation for over three decades.”

Roberts was one of those early pioneers. She was a two-time Senior World bronze medalist in women’s freestyle wrestling, as well as a successful high school and college athlete. Roberts was third in the 2003 and 2005 Senior World Championships for Team USA. She was a three-time national champion, a 2003 World Cup champion and was the first U.S. woman to win the prestigious Ivan Yarygin Grand Prix in Russia two times. She placed second in the 2008 U.S. Olympic Team Trials. She competed on the women’s wrestling teams at the University of Minnesota-Morris and at Pacific University, before becoming a U.S. Olympic Training Center resident athlete. She also served six years in the Army as a Special Operations soldier, where she volunteered for deployment to Afghanistan.

Why Girls Should Wrestle

“Beyond the technical components of wrestling, the sport helps girls develop accountability, confidence, grit, resilience, self-esteem, and tenacity—each of which are attributes of strong and effective leadership,” Roberts says. “Wrestling teaches girls how to own their own space, voice, and body, allowing them to belong, to be noticed, taken seriously, be seen as worthy, and capable of achieving their dreams. Wrestling is a physiological movement of expression that allows girls to be powerful and take leadership positions—and we need more women leaders!”

Through WLAG, Roberts leads the advocacy campaign to increase access and equality for girls wrestling across the nation. WLAG has created a state sanctioning task force in unsanctioned states that convenes cross-sector multi-stakeholder coalitions to bring diversity of thought, people, and skills together to promote and advance girls high school wrestling.

“We have powerful teams working cohesively together to create a strong foundation at the grassroots level with the goal of securing a state championship recognized by each state executive association,” Roberts says. “This state sanctioning effort, which is being conducted concurrently with the NCAA Emerging Sport Status endeavor, provides educational, social, and financial mobility to girls. Decision makers and the media are kept informed of each state’s effort, success, and the ever-increasing participation numbers lead to increased acceptance, opportunities, and access.”

The time is now says Fulp.

“Today, thousands of young girls continue to lace up their wrestling shoes and walk onto mats across the nation,” Fulp says. “They no longer want or need to test themselves against boys to find success and enjoy the tough physical nature of wrestling. They want to test themselves against other tough females. Opportunities for equitable competition results in greater visibility. More visibility results in acceptance, appreciation and an understanding that girls can derive the same benefits from participating in combat sports as boys have for decades.”

Yamamoto agrees, saying “girls wrestling in high school are showing all their peers that the aggressiveness and physicality of wrestling was not a male trait but a human one. The qualities that are unique to girls and women are not a weakness in any sport, and definitely not wrestling. On the contrary, high school girls are proving that wrestling is a place where the best things about being female can be showcased and expressed.”