It started off as two girls trying to join the all-boys wrestling team. They succeeded, and this season they are now the co-captains of a new girls wrestling team of 12.
During their freshman year, sophomores Nayeli Chinique and Na’Shae Garnett joined the boys wrestling team at Krop.
“It was kind of tricky for me because it was a different atmosphere,” Garnett said. “I had to get in the right mentality and know how to deal with certain things and my emotions.”
Garnett joined the team to learn self-defense for when she goes off to college. Chinique had been wrestling since middle school and was inspired by her father, who used to wrestle.
Wrestling Coach Shakir Francois has been coaching wrestling at Krop for 13 years and this is the first year coaching a girls wrestling team for the school.
“They’re more excited than the boys at times because they are willing to 100 percent commit with zero fears,” Francois said. “The girls are with this one hundred percent and they’re going to score.”
The boys and girls wrestling team train together everyday after school and have no difference in their training. They divide and train based on weight class, but when on tournaments, they separate, with girls wrestling in the girls division and boys in the boys division.
“We relate to everything, we all have periods and hormones and the boys don’t, so whenever we have practice and some of us are on our monthly, the girls are always there to comfort each other,” Chinique said.
According to MaxPreps there are around 12 girl wrestling teams and 200 boys wrestling teams in Florida. This vast difference between the amount of girls wrestling teams versus boys wrestling teams shows the importance of girls in high school entering the male dominated sport of wrestling.
“It’s important for it to be a girls wrestling team now because we need girls to learn how to defend themselves in the real world and it also gives you a different outlook on life, teaches you commitment and how to handle your emotions,” Garnett said.