New York will be joining Texas, Hawaii, Washington and California when the Public School Athletic League establishes a wrestling league entirely for girls, beginning in March and ending with a tournament in May. The plan is to have 16 teams for around 300 girls, spanning from all five boroughs. There will be 12 weight classes. This is awesome.
Although the league’s creation isn’t related, Ronda Rousey became the first female fighter to win a UFC match just last week. Her match against Liz Carmouche was the main event on Saturday’s pay-per-view and, despite the fight’s brevity, incredibly entertaining. Both of these occurrences do share something in common, though: both are demonstrations that women fighting or sparring isn’t merely a novelty or an Andy Kaufman joke. Judging from the estimated numbers of only a two-month league, girls want to wrestle, and there enough of them to stop the process of having them awkwardly wrestle a boy and everyone having to comment or make stupid jokes about it.
Also, if you look at it even more broadly, this means an increase of people who want to get into the sport. See how wrong and stupid you are, International Olympic Committee?
(Photo: Chris Hunkeler/Flickr)
