Earlier this morning I heard about a boy in Iowa who wouldn’t wrestle a girl in a State Championship in Des Moines. The first thing that came to mind was that there was a girl who was actually wrestling! We didn’t have wrestling in my 2A high school, so I am not to up-to-date on the sport. Area schools around us did, but no girls ever joined the team. I was quite surprised that it made the national news. Joel Northrup, a sophomore boy who was homeschooled refused to wrestle the girl, Cassy Herkelman, in the State Championship. He said it was against his religious beliefs. Some believed that he would have won the championship if he wouldn’t have forfeited the first match against Herkelman. Her record was 20-13 going into the match and Northrup’s was 35-4. He had every reason to want to win that Thursday.
Cassy Herkelman was not hurt by what 14- year old Joel Northrup did. She said it was his beliefs and he made the choice; no one made it for him. Northrup’s father wasn’t angry at his son either. He was in high spirits that his son didn’t fall for the pressure from his religious beliefs and that he stuck with what he believed. I’m sure it wasn’t an easy choice to default to a freshman, let alone a girl. Not to mention it was the first time ever a girl won by default in the state of Iowa and she actually quilified for state in its 85 - year history. If I was in this position I think I would feel the same way the Cassy feels. She couldn’t make Northrup wrestle her and she wasn’t hurt over it. I also believe that Joel made the right choice, wrestling can become very violent.
To me, if there is going to be more girls becoming involved in Wrestling, then there should be separate matches, those for boys and then those for girls. I’m all for girls being able to prove that they can play the same sports as boys. Believe me, my 9 year old sister played peewee football this past summer and she loved it. That’s why there is such a thing called powder puff football for girls because when the boys catch up our maturity they hit much harder and are built more stout. When it comes to someone’s religious beliefs I believe somewhere there should be separation in the sport. There are some states that do have separate teams for boys and girls, Texas being one of them. With wrestling being very popular in Iowa, I think they should defiantly step up their game and get girls a league of their own so these situations don’t pop up any more and so someone with a much better record than his opponent can shoe his/her stuff.
I also saw this article. It made me wonder though how much of his refusal to particpate was based on his religious beliefs. I have to admire him for the forfeit if he was truly standing his ground on his religious beliefs. I guess my question is are the males wreslers being made aware that they can face an opponent of the oppoiste sex and they choose to participate, thinking it will not come to fruition? It would be hard probably to have male and female classes. Even with wrestling being huge in Iowa, i can only imagine the girls choosing to participate is a very small number thus making matches against your own gender difficult to schedule
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