Even though there are male and female wrestlers, wrestling is considered to be a male-dominated sport. Some female high school wrestlers at Ripon High want this to change but many actually believe that wrestling has changed and become a more equal sport.

“I don’t really notice that I’m surrounded by guys,” said freshman Emily Ahuna “We’re all friendly with each other and we’re all a team.” She said that she feels like wrestling used to be a male-dominated sport but not as much nowadays.

Ahuna isn’t the only one who feels that gender bias in wrestling isn’t the same as what it was. “I don’t think wrestling is a male-dominated sport,” said sophomore Melissa Perez

Although the male majority in wrestling is changing, there are still things that make women feel excluded.  “Some things that make me feel excluded,” said Perez “Whenever we have a dual meet and the other team doesn’t have girls, people ask me ‘Do you even wrestle?’ and it bothers me so much.”

Other girls feel excluded for other reasons, such as being an underclassman or not knowing many people on the team. 

“The only thing that makes me feel excluded was being a freshman, just because most of the team had been around each other they knew each other before they knew me,” said Ahuna.

Ripon High only has male coaches and some students argue that having at least one girl coach would be helpful. “Sometimes it is awkward when I’m having personal problems and I can’t really talk to my coaches about it,” Ahuna said.

Although having a female coach might be easier, the team is happy with the coaches they have now. 

One of the major debates of wrestling is whether females should be able to wrestle males. Many women argue that they can handle wrestling the guys. Also, girls often don’t get to wrestle because there aren’t enough girls on the other team to wrestle them.

“I do believe girls can wrestle boys in the same weight class,” Perez said. She said that there are some cases where they can’t wrestle each other, but a lot of the time it would work.

Despite not having as many opportunities to wrestle during league matches, the girls’ were successful in divisions on Saturday, February 3rd. Alayna Swilley won her 2nd straight Sac-Joaquin South Regional Wrestling title. Alayna and 4 of her teammates will move on to the Sac-Joaquin Girls’ Masters in two weeks with a chance to qualify for state.

Also moving on for RHS are Alyssa Oliver who placed 5th, Marissa Hernandez and Faith Borges who placed 7th, and Melissa Perez who placed 8th. The team placed 6th overall.