Rolling out the welcome mats: Varsity girls' wrestling begins at CHS

A groundswell of support for adding girls wrestling at Carrington High School, to bookend the longstanding Class B power boys program, started with one girl in particular speaking up.

When junior Taya Lura, the younger sister of two past CHS state champions, Riley and Brecken, approached her fellow classmates about starting a varsity team, they listened.

Eighteen interested participants later, the Cardinal mat girls are ready to step under the center light and into the circle this winter for their inaugural season.

The team will be led by former CHS boys' program coach Mark Pazdernik, who served in that role from 1999 to 2011.

"I feel privileged and honored, but at the same time scared and nervous," said Pazdernik of starting a varsity sport largely from scratch. "It's like riding a bike in that usually nobody can ride one the first time they get on it. Riding it perfect will take time, and the same will go for girls wrestling."

In the past, CHS has had the occasional female wrestler, but until last year when the NDHSAA hosted their first state girls tournament at the Fargodome in conjunction with the boys event, there was no realistic outlet for varsity competition outside of earning a spot in the boys' lineup.

There have been a handful of girls throughout the state who have competed in boys' state tournaments pre-2021.

Now, girls at Carrington have the opportunity to wrestle others of their same sex, on a level playing field.

"What's really nice from my end is how excited the girls are," said Pazdernik. "They've been waiting patiently for the first day of practice. They're a very eager group that picks up on wrestling technique very fast, and are willing to learn."

He said with a chuckle, "Two practices in, if somebody walked into practice off the street, they would probably think we must have been practicing for a month or two already, or that we're on our second year of girls' wrestling here."

Interest in the sport, at least in the region, has spiked with the success of the women's program at the University of Jamestown, and with the U of J playing host to the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) Invitational since 2019. Beginning this year, Jamestown will host the now-upgraded NAIA National Championships at Harold Newman Arena.

Just as there are with the boys, girls wrestling consists of 14 weight classes, beginning in this case with 100 pounds, and increasing by five-pound increments for the next nine classes until 145. Then, there is a 10-pound jump to 155, 15 more to 170, 20 to 190, and the final class tops out at 235 pounds maximum.

"As of right now, we should be able to fill the majority of them," said Pazdernik.

He largely credits Lura with "getting the ball rolling" on the program.

"Last spring, there were about 25 girls interested from grades 6 through 11," he said. "Coach [Josh] Kerbaugh, Coach [Kip] Kovar and Coach [Bill] Holtan held a practice twice a week for the month of March for the ones that wanted to do it, and there were around 15 or 16 girls who showed up for every practice."

With that level of dedication evident, the Carrington School Board kept the sport on their radar, before voting to start the sport officially in April, 2021.

For her credit, Lura has taken the opportunity to better herself during the spring Pitcrew season, and she won a state Greco-Roman championship in Jamestown in just her second career tournament this past April. Freshman Khendra Garcia did her one better, taking the freestyle title in her first tournament.

The other wrestler with past experience for the Cards coming into this season is eighth grader Journey Peltier, who also competed and placed at that same state event.

Taya Lura's family ties with the sport are not the only ones on this squad.

Coach Kovar's daughter, sophomore Kendall, comes to the girls team by following the footsteps of her brother, CHS senior Kael Kovar, and her uncle, Kevin, was a state champion for Rugby in the early 1990's. Sophomore Mercedes Lura's dad, Brock, is also an assistant coach and father of 2022 graduate and former Cardinal wrestler Jonathan Lura.

In addition, senior Kennedy Wendel has several cousins who competed in the sport at a high level in LaMoure, and freshmen Ashley Lindberg and eighth grader Madalina Ciubotareanu also have present or past wrestling siblings at CHS.

Others on the Cardinal roster are senior Trisa Schroeder, juniors Karlee Lesmann and Kylie Skadberg, sophomore Jazmyn Ybarra, freshmen Juliet Davis, Ashley Lindberg, Jyllian Parker and Nevaeh Sorensen, eighth grader Paige Studdard, and seventh graders Kenzie Jost and Kaydence Kirkeby.

Pazdernik explained that most of the time, the team will be attending the same tournaments as the boys, but, "there's about five times that we'll be heading in a different direction."

"We don't have a lot of duals lined up because most schools either don't have a full lineup, or don't know how many girls they will have out," he said.

Scheduled events for CHS girls wrestling are as follows (all tournaments are grades 7-12):

Nov. 19 Minot Tourney

Dec. 3 Jamestown Tourney

Dec. 9 Carrington Duals (Legacy, South Border)

Dec. 10 Carrington Tourney, 10 a.m.

Dec. 17 So. Border Tourney

Dec. 29-30 Rumble on the Red, Fargo

Jan. 5 Central Cass Dual @ Casselton, 6 p.m.

Jan. 6-7 Rotary @ Bismarck

Jan. 14 @ Minot

Jan. 21 Lisbon Tourney, 9:30 a.m.

Jan. 26 D.L./W. Fargo @ Devils Lake

Jan. 28 @ Central Cass

Feb. 3 @ Napoleon

Feb. 10 Region Tourney @ Grand Forks, 10 a.m.

Feb. 16-18 State @ Fargo