INDIANAPOLIS- On Friday, more than 200 girls across the state of Indiana will compete in the Inaugural IHSAA girls wrestling finals.
Franklin Central High Schools is sending seven of their wrestlers.
“I feel like us seven girls that are going are going to do really good actually,” said Dayana Myers, a senior wrestler at Franklin Central.
“I’m glad I get to be part of the first I mean it's cool, cool thing,” said Madeline Thompson, a junior on the team.
In April of 2024 Indiana became the 46th state to recognize girls wrestling as a varsity sport. For the last three years, the girls wrestling was classified as an “emerging sport.” The program at Franklin Central started three years ago. Myers and Thompson were on it from day one.
“Probably the adrenaline part, I’m not thinking when I’m wrestling,” said Myers on why she joined.
“My sister influenced it. She wanted to start it and she kind of was like ‘hey try this new thing with me,’ so I did and ended up really loving it,” said Thompson.
Their head coach, Kevin Moore, was already coaching the boys team and saw how quickly the girls wrestling was growing.
“My daughter wrestles in the youth program and I think I wanted to try and get something started that I envisioned for them coming up in the future,” said Moore.
Girls wrestling is exploding. It’s one of the fastest growing high schools sports in the country. According to NFHS, more than 64,000 girls participated in 2022-2023 which is a 102% increase from the previous year. At Franklin Central, the program went from eight girls in year one to 30 girls the year.
“Now we’ve added wrestling for the girls that are not really a basketball player, not wanting to get in the pool, maybe a little more aggressive and need somewhere else to put their frustrations. It’s opened up a new game for everyone else,” said Moore.
Franklin Central won their inaugural sectional and regional titles. Competing as a sanctioned sport now makes all the hard work that much sweeter.
“I think it’s really important and it gives the sport a lot of value and it gives people something they can work for,” said Thompson.
“Just being able to bring seven girls that I know are tough, tough as nails, being able to bring them there to showcase our community is huge,” said Moore.
State Finals will get underway at 10 a.m. inside the Corteva Coliseum at State Fairgrounds. State Championship matches start at 7 pm.
For more information you can visit the IHSAA website.
