For the past few years, more and more high school girls have been wrestling. Most of the time, the girls have had to wrestle boys. Some have made it to the state tournament but few have had much success at that level. This year, with the inception of girls wrestling, more girls than ever came out, 148 to be exact. All qualified for the tournament. They represented 45 teams from AA to Class C. The tournament was held at Lockwood, the newest Billings high school over the weekend.
Flathead won the team scoring followed by Billings Senior. Both are AA schools. Class C Cascade came in third. Hamilton finished in 18th place with 33 points. Florence finished with 20 points and Corvallis had 17 points.
The high point for the valley was O’Maste Foster of Florence. She has been wrestling since she was very young, coming up through the ranks of Little Guy Wrestling and then continuing as a Falcon in high school. Initially this year, she didn’t go out for wrestling because of COVID and because she didn’t think there would be a heavyweight class. But there was one and Foster came out late in the season. Foster received a bye in her first round at state and advanced to the championship round. Her opponent was Kali Hood of Columbus-Absorkee-Park City. Foster won a 5-3 decision to win the championship.
Hamilton’s Hannah Hurst finished second at 120 after being pinned by Jessica Gubler of Livingston-Big Timer at 30 seconds. Corvallis’ Kira Davis finished fifth at 103 when she pinned Cali Pasante of Anaconda at 30 seconds.