As tryouts come to a close and winter sports begin, NDB has introduced wrestling to the community.
In the past couple years women’s wrestling has become one of the fastest growing sports in high school. According to the National Federation of State High School Associates, the number of high school girls participating in wrestling has quintupled since 2013 and doubled from 2022 to 2023.
NDB’s team will be wrestling alongside their brother school, Serra HS under the same coaches. The team will also be utilizing Serra’s equipment and facilities which are monitored by head wrestling coach, Mike Klobushar.
According to Head of Student Services, Arlene Empleo, NDB has been hoping to create a wrestling team at the high school for a few years. However, a policy of one new sport a school year has been preventing the addition. Luckily, this year, wrestling has been carefully chosen to add to the mix.
Serra wrestling coach Jeff Sereni has returned to the mat, taking the responsibility of coaching NDB’s wrestling program. Previously, he was a coach at Serra for 10 years; however decided to take a break roughly twenty years ago. This season, Sereni looks forward to returning to the ring and is eager to watch the girls grow.
Sereni also finds that wrestling plays an essential role in women’s self esteem.
“Just from the simple aspect of the confidence that you can gain in the sport and everything that goes… along with the sport, the discipline…the drive, the competitiveness, everything about it…just lifts the girls up, as opposed to breaking them down,” Sereni says.
One of the most beneficial aspects of wrestling includes the different several weight classes players can play in. Sereni finds this part of the sport inspiring, “that’s the nice thing about wrestling, there’s…14 different weight classes, so there’s a spot for everybody. And it doesn’t matter, just like on the boys side, it doesn’t matter height, weight, size, anything like that. It’s about how hard you’re willing to work and you have an opportunity to be a champion.”
This year, Coach Sereni’s main goal is to encourage students to give wrestling a shot, stating, “you can’t say you don’t like it if you don’t try it. So give it a try.”
These words of encouragement have reached students at NDB such as Sophomore Taylor Hom, who before this year, never participated in wrestling.
“I have competitively participated in Martial Arts such as Taekwondo since the age of 7. When I had found out about the plan for a wrestling season here at NDB I was super excited to participate,” said Hom.
When asked why she chose wrestling as her fall sport, Hom said, “I felt it was important to participate
and establish a wrestling reputation for the school, it allows for a new opportunity here at NDB, and allows me to experience as new set of challenges I haven’t before.”
Alongside Taylor Hom, Freshman Kathy Dinger will also be joining the team and looks forward to participating this fall.
Practices will be held from 3:30 to 5:30, Monday through Friday at Serra HS’s lunch room. The cafeteria is transformed into an arena with several mats open for students of both genders to compete on. While tryouts finished earlier this month, Coach Sereni is still encouraging Tigers to join the team throughout the month of December.
The first match of the season is coming up on Friday, December 6th. NDB will be competing against Bristow Brawl at Atwater HS in the afternoon. Students are encouraged to come support the team on their first competition of many.
