MV girls’ wrestling aims high as young program gains experience

The foundation has been laid. Now the building begins for the Mount Vernon girls’ wrestling team.

The Yellow Jackets, in just their third year as a team, will have 11 wrestlers competing, with 10 having experience on the mat.

“It's a lot easier this year because we're growing instead of just starting from scratch all over again, teaching the basics. We're able to expand a little bit this year and then we've got the freshman coming up and everybody knows the basics right now,” said Mount Vernon girls’ wrestling coach Jay DePolo. “We're just tightening them up and those girls are just kind of building on what they already know which is gives us kind of a leg up and I think a good foundation moving forward in the next couple of years. Some of these girls will have by the time they graduate, five or six years of experience.”

The Jackets will have plenty of experience back, led by seniors Mahayley Laverick and Khadija Ndow. Both wrestlers just missed qualifying for districts a year ago and will be back ready to take that next step this winter.

Also back is junior Ashlynn Brokaw, who won a state title a year ago at 105 pounds after finishing third her freshman year. The title was the first in school history, and after suffering a leg injury and having to rehab it this summer, Brokaw is doing everything necessary to give herself an opportunity to repeat.

“She was off all off-season. She started back probably a couple of months ago, started kind of dipping into the club and then coming in here a little bit and doing some great stuff. I think I think it may have helped her because she's kind of refreshed and she's healthy and she feels good and she's moving good gave her a little bit of a breather because well, honestly, she's been going nonstop since sixth grade,” DePolo said.

Also out are sophomores Evelyn Martinez, Americus Frazee, Massilyn Ricketts and Alivia Zimmerman. Zimmerman was a district qualifier as a freshman, finishing fourth in the sectional tournament.

New to the team this season will be senior Joy Morman, as well as freshmen Jessie Bals-Perez, Genevieve Frazee and Luci Parker. The freshmen all wrestled with the middle school and youth programs, so they will bring some mat experience with them to the team.

The Jackets have beefed up the schedule this year, hosting their own girls’ wrestling tournament on Feb. 1 and will be participating in a dual team tournament at Marysville. They begin the season on Sunday at the Highland Invitational.

“It’s pretty exciting (hosting their own tournament). We wanted to do it last year but then the logistics didn't work out so it'll be the first Mount Vernon girl's legacy tournament,” said DePolo. “That's kind of been our theme. You know we have a legacy award. In this tournament I wanted to kind of stick with that same thing because, 10 years from now 15 years from now, people are going to look back and see these are the girls that set the legacy, the building blocks for the girls down the road.

“We’re hoping to get you upwards of 20 teams show up. (Mount Vernon) has got a lot of history of tournaments here — with the John Brown, the John Frye youth tournaments, and we just kind of want to build on that. The girls are excited. They don't get a lot of opportunities to compete in front of the home crowd.”