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Avon had two girl wrestlers on the Bon Homme/Scotland/ Avon girl’s wrestling team this 2023-2024 wrestling season. Ashley Tolsma and Hope Kemnitz were both first year wrestlers on the team. This is the fourth year since South Dakota first sanctioned girls wrestling in 2021. Even though it was the fourth year of SDHSAA sanctioned wrestling, in Avon this was not necessarily common knowledge. The 2023- 2024 season was the first year that Avon has had any girl wrestlers. According to the Lakota Times, there were 125 girls out for wrestling the first year, 284 girls the second year, and 416 girls the third year in South Dakota. The first year of girls wrestling there were only four weight classes as a starting point, but that has quickly grown into currently having 12 weight classes. Girl’s wrestling is also starting to take off at the youth AAU stages which will be a great way to continue building numbers at the high school level. The SDHSAA is currently considering having a separate girl’s tournament a week before they would hold the boys’ wrestling championships. It is wonderful that Avon has several girls on the team that are paving the way for future generations of girls’ wrestlers. Ashley Tolsma Ashley Tolsma is the daughter of Jeff Tolsma and Misty Hanvey. Ashley is currently in her junior year at Avon High School. She wrestled in the 165th weight class. When asked how she became interested in wrestling, Ashley said that her brother and stepbrothers wrestled when she was young and she always thought it was awesome. Even when girls could join wrestling teams and wrestle against boys, Ashley did not join. It was not until in the past couple of years when girls’ wrestling became sanctioned that the idea of wrestling once again started to blossom in Ashley’s head again. Being very new to the wrestling world (only having actually wrestled for about 3-4 month in total) it was her coaches that helped inspire Ashley. Coaches, Peyton and Ben Hellman, were very helpful and inspiring to the girls’ team. They held open mats at the beginning of the season for just the girls. Coach Jimmy Kocher was also very supportive and positive throughout the season. Ashley has really enjoyed that wrestling is a very individual sport where one gets what one puts into it; therefore, the harder one works in practice, the better he or she will wrestle in a match. Wrestling is very different than other sports in that competitors are allowed to pick on each other a little bit just to push each other further to make both competitors better. The over-under hip toss is Ashley’s favorite most useful move and the funniest move that she has never found a useful way to use in a match is called the surfboard. Even though it is only Ashley’s first year wrestling, her biggest career highlight to date would be making it to the state tournament her first year and placing 8th. The way that Ashley prepares for a wrestling meet is that she gets a lot of sleep and does her prepping during the week so that she does not have to stress out the day before weigh-ins. She mostly just tries to eat right, get plenty of sleep and keeps her body feeling well. Ashley’s most challenging meet of the season would have to be the last match in the state tournament for 7th and 8th place. She had lost the match to place 5th or 6th the night before and during that match had gotten a high ankle sprain. She really wanted to do well in her last match of the season, even though she was hurt. It was a big struggle to get herself mentally more so than physically prepared for the final match of the post season. The best part of her experience of the season would be getting to start from ground zero with her friend, Hope Kemnitz, and watching both of them get better as the season progressed. When asked how it feels to be a pioneer and one of the first female wrestlers for Avon, Ashley said it feels great to be the first girl from Avon to make it to and place at the state tournament. With sports changing so that all girls can be a part of all sports; it makes Ashley realize that she will always be the first to do those things at AHS. There can never be another first person again in her respective categories which is a special feeling. One of the biggest challenges for Ashley in comparison to her male counterparts would be the distance that the girls’ team had to travel for the tournament. The closest tournament that the Bon Homme/Scotland/Avon team went to this year was in Yankton where she competed in a round robin style tournament. The biggest tournaments were in Rapid City and near Sioux Falls with some lasting more than two days. The girls also competed in a couple of tournaments in Nebraska. With the tournaments so far away, it was too far for her family to travel to most of the time which was hard not have her support system there to watch and cheer her on. The hardest parts about being a wrestler are the predictability of the sport, dieting and practices. These all became easier as the season progressed, but it was definitely very challenging at first. Ashley felt that the pressure to do well at wrestling and maintaining weight were probably the most difficult parts for her. Ashley ended her first season with a record of 18 -20. She is planning to wrestle next year and get better with every practice and match. Ashley would like to thank all of the guys who convinced her to join the wrestling team, because it was very much worth it. She only wishes she would have joined sooner. She would like to thank her family for all their support and being her cheering section even if sometimes it had to be from home. Finally, Ashley would like to thank Jimmy K. for always keeping his word and dying his mustache pink to match Ashley’s hair. Hope Kemnitz Hope is the daughter of Travis and Danae Kemnitz. She is currently in her sophomore year at Avon High School. For the 2023-2024 season, Hope wrestled in the 185-weight class. When asked how she became interested in wrestling, Hope said that Travis Tjeerdsma had always wanted her to wrestle. She found out that Peyton Hellman was holding a camp for girls that were interested in wrestling. Hope decided to give it a try and ended up falling in love with the sport. Coaches Ben Hellman and Jimmy K were definitely helpful to Hope in her inaugural year of wrestling. The two were always right there with Hope after each of her matches to tell her good job and give her pointers on what she needs to work on for the following match. Ben and Jimmy taught Hope a lot about wrestling and being a part of the team would not be the same without them. What Hope enjoyed most during her wrestling season was how all the practicing and work got Hope into really good shape. She also just overall finds wrestling to be a very fun sport. Hope’s favorite wrestling move is called “The Fireman”, she is still working on perfecting it. A couple of Hope’s career highlights during her first year would be when she won her first varsity tournament in Chamberlain and making to state her first year of wrestling. Hope would get herself prepared for wrestling meets by making sure that she was organized the night before that way in the morning she would not be rushing around starting her day in chaos. Before her matches she liked to listen to music that would get her pumped up and ready to take the mat. For Hope, the most challenging match of the year was wrestling Kyra Tostenson in the championship match at the Chamberlain tournament. Hope wrestled Kyra all three periods with Hope finally winning the match by points. The highlight of the season for Hope would be seeing how much she improved throughout the season. When asked how she felt about being a pioneer for AHS for girls wrestling, Hope said that it felt good to know that she was one of the first wrestlers from Avon. She hopes that other female athletes will want to join the Bon Homme/Scotland/ Avon wrestling team and that the team will grow in numbers. As a female wrestler, one of the challenges that Hope faces is some people’s beliefs that girls should not be wrestling because it is a boy’s sport. Hope feels lucky in the aspect that their team is very supportive and only wants each other to improve. The hardest part of being a wrestler is the mental and physical toughness that is required. Practices are hard, but have a very rewarding outcome. Hope ended the season with a record of 11-16. She will definitely be wrestling again next season. Hope would like to see other girls want to join and their team grow in numbers. For Hope it would be awesome to see all of the weight classes filled next season. Hope would like to thank the fans, especially her parents, for always coming to the matches and cheering her and her teammates on. She would also like to thank all of the coaches that helped her throughout the year. Thank you, Ashley and Hope, for sharing your first wrestling season experiences. Congratulations to you both on a great first season and for paving the way for other girls to join girls’ wrestling. We cannot wait to see what great things you will do on and off the mat next year.