Congratulations to La Plata Head Wrestling Coach John Pankhurst on earning his 300th career victory on Jan. 21, 2025
Wrestling takes more than physical strength. “It’s a lot of mental stuff,” Oriana Boling, a La Plata High School senior, said. “I’d say it’s more mental than physical.”
Boling is among the girls who are making high school wrestling one of — if not the No. 1 — fastest growing sport among their peers. The La Plata girls wrestling team started out two years ago with five members and now has 16 members. The team recently placed first with 143.5 points at the Francis Scott Key Girl’s Wrestling Holiday Showcase in Union Bridge.
Held Dec. 28 at Francis Scott Key High School, 20 teams were invited to the showcase to compete. La Plata seniors Daisy Rojas and Boling placed first in their weight classes, 155 and 130, respectively, with senior Madison Rich taking second in the 130 weight class. Adriana Hernandez, a junior, took the title in the 145 division while freshmen Grace Immler in the 100 class and Kenadi Reeder in the 235 division took home third-place accolades.
Boling, Rojas and Rich are three of the “founding” members of the girls wrestling team at La Plata. All played or participated in sports before taking a leap of faith to try grappling. Boling was the statistician for the boys wrestling team, Rojas was a competitive cheerleader and ran track while Rich was a lacrosse player.
John Pankhurst, La Plata’s head wrestling coach, started looking around for students who might want to try a new sport or at least were looking for one to do in the winter. Boling, familiar with wrestling thanks to her role keeping stats, figured trying it out wouldn’t hurt. It was the same for Rojas. She was ready to try something different and Rich was joking around members of the boys wrestling team during a break at a mulch sale fundraiser when Pankhurst suggested she try out the sport.
“It’s something a few girls were doing,” Pankhurst said of wrestling. “Almost all the kids on the team play a different sport. We promoted it to kids who play sports but want to try something different.”
“It’s a male dominated sport, but girls can wrestle too,” Rojas said. At first the girls learned the basics and wrestled with members of the boys team as female competitors were in short supply. La Plata has the largest girls wrestling team in Charles County Public Schools (CCPS), but they aren’t alone anymore. There are 38 female wrestlers throughout CCPS high schools. With any start up, participation might be slow at the beginning — it just takes a few to break through and pique the interest of others.
“Over the years, we have tried to recruit girls to try it and see if they like it,” Rich said. “And it’s also about people just encouraging girls to just do it.”
Boling agreed. She said sometimes it just comes down to having an option. “We were given the opportunity,” she said.
Gaining popularity – Hawaii was the first state — in 1998 — to recognize high school girls wrestling as an official sport, according to USA Wrestling, the country’s governing organization for freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling.
Girls wrestling in high schools across the country has been gaining popularity since the start of the 2000s, picking up momentum following the introduction of female wrestling in the 2004 Olympic games.
Maryland girls don’t have to look too far to find role models in the sport. Helen Maroulis, a native of Rockville, was a member of the U.S. Women’s Wrestling Olympic team for the 2016, 2020 and 2024 games. She earned a gold medal in the 2016 games and bronze medals during the 2020 and 2024 events. Nebi Tsarni, a 2024 graduate of Montgomery County Public Schools and three-time state wrestling champ, was honored with the 2024 Tricia Saunders High School Excellence Award given by the National Wrestling Hall of Fame.
Rojas, who won a state championship in 2024 and plans to continue wrestling at Alvernia University where she plans to major in biology, said sports are a positive way to give students an outlet. She’s found that in wrestling. “It’s a really good way to help with mental toughness, discipline and strategy,” Rojas said, reiterating Boling’s assertion that wrestling takes just as much mental as physical strength.
On the brink of graduation — Boling has committed to wrestle at Frostburg State University where she’ll major in criminal justice, while Rich will attend McDaniel College to major in nursing and wrestle — the senior members of La Plata’s team are leaving what they helped build in the hands of their younger teammates.
Immler, who has played softball and volleyball, was encouraged to look into different sports at her father’s suggestion. Coming from middle school, Immler would be introduced to new athletic opportunities in high school like field hockey and wrestling. Since he wrestled in his youth, Immler’s dad floated the idea to her. He heard that Pankhurst was a top-notch coach and the program at La Plata was growing.
“It’s a lot harder than it looks,” Immler said of wrestling. But she’s found that she enjoys the competition and camaraderie with her teammates. “It’s a team sport, but it’s also an independent sport,” she said. “I think that’s my favorite part about it.”
