Girls get their chance at Rollie Lane

The Rollie Lane Invitational at the Ford Idaho Center in Nampa has been a good measuring stick for exactly where certain high school wrestling teams are for years now.

So when it came to adding a girls tournament to the mix, why not Rollie?

Right?

AFTER HAVING four female wrestlers compete in the event in 2017, in brackets with the boys, 88 wrestled in the event this year in girls-only brackets, with 33 schools represented with girls teams.

Post Falls, with only three wrestlers competing in the girls tournament, finished runner-up with individual champions Brelane Huber (113/120 pounds), a junior, and Jaselyn Jones (138/145 pounds), a sophomore, winning their respective brackets.

“It was advertised after last year’s state tournament that there would be several schools offering a girls division during their annual boys tournament,” Post Falls coach Pete Reardon said. “Coeur d’Alene is offering a girls division at the North Idaho Rumble (Jan. 25-26).

Senior Taylor Cook finished fourth in the 138/145 pound division for Post Falls.

“It was great and I think a great boost to our girls confidence,” Reardon said. “Being able to compete on a level playing field is a nice change for our girls.”

Lakeland sophomore Savannah Kidwell was fifth at 113/120 and junior Anni Austin was fifth at 152/170 for Timberlake.

“It’s special for the girls that are wrestling,” Timberlake coach Kelly Amos said. “They get a chance to wrestle against other females, which was great for those girls. My girl (Austin) said ‘that was weird’ after first match, because she has never wrestled anyone but males.”

Coeur d’Alene, the only other area school to compete at the tournament, did not enter a female wrestler.

Ontario (Ore.), which brought 11 female wrestlers, won the girls team title with 97 points.

Both Washington and Oregon sanction girls wrestling as a high school sport.

“Female wrestling is going to happen,” Amos said. “It’s already an Olympic sport. The wrestling community needs to continue to do things like what Rollie Lane did and what the North Idaho Rumble is going to do to prove to the state it’s a viable sport.”

“North Idaho has produced the most decorated female wrestlers in the state,” Amos added. “There are some schools that made more of a push to get female wrestlers; they just happen to be in the Southwest. Adding the sport for North and western Idaho is a lot easier considering Washington and Oregon have already sanctioned female wrestling.”

TY JONES, the Idaho High School Activities Association executive director, has seen some stable growth in the sport in recent years as far as female competitors.

“Our boys numbers have gone down a bit over the past few years,” Jones said. “Our girls numbers have seen good growth though. Two years ago, we ended up with about 45-50 girls at the end of the season. Last year, we were almost to 100 at the end. And this year, we started with about 125. I think that’s pretty good growth. Hopefully it continues.”

Jones added the growth will need to continue to see a girls-only state tournament. Until then, the girls have to continue to wrestle with the boys in Idaho.

“Our board did not feel that the numbers were there to have a standalone girls tournament,” Jones said. “This was from last year. I cannot answer for all board members, but I would think we would need to be between 200-250 for our board to look at it again. I do see a girls tournament in the future if we continue the growth patterns that we have had. I just don’t know when that will be. Our schools need to continue to host girls-only tournaments as standalone tournaments, or in conjunction with other tournaments they currently host. Once the numbers increase, our board will discuss it again.”

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for the Coeur d’Alene Press. He can be reached by telephone at (208) 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at jelliott@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter @JECdAPress.