FM lady grapplers off to good start

Starting on the right foot

Going into this year, I thought it would be hard to beat the emotion from last year. But after two really hard weeks of practice, we went up to Cardinal and put a pounding on everybody.”

Kyle Doherty, Lady Hounds Head Coach

FORT MADISON – The Fort Madison girls' wrestling program is looking to build on a very successful first year in 2022 where two girls qualified for the state wrestling tournament and a handful of others just missed making the trip.
Junior Hailey Kemper is coming off a season where she won the 100 lb. bracket in regional action last year to qualify for the state meet, which is now being held at the Xtream Arena in Coralville. Kemper went 2-2 last year and failed to make the podium, but has her eyes set on building on that performance.
Sophomore Mara Smith advanced to the state tournament after finishing fifth in a disappointing regional. However, one of the girls who qualified suffered a season-ending injury and Smith was moved into that spot qualifying her for state action.
Smith wrestled at 115 last year as a freshman and will wrestle at 120 lbs. this year.
Head Coach Kyle Doherty said Fort Madison has immediately begun to get recognition throughout the state even with just one year under their respective belts.
“People I ran into across the summer were definitely recognizing this program for last year’s work. Sending two girls to state was extremely good, but we had several more that were knocking on the door and that was really emotional for them,” Doherty said.
One of those is returner Sadie Brandon who suffered a last minute loss in the regional 4^th place match keeping her from a turn in Coralville.
“I think hopefully some of them that got to experience that atmosphere at regionals and got to compete there got the feel of that. It certainly seems they did so far,” Doherty said.
The Hounds already have a title this year after winning the Cardinal Community Schools varsity quadrangular Monday night.
The Lady Hounds downed Albia 60-24, Cardinal 66-18,  Highland 42-18, and Lone Tree 54-0. Fort Madison lost just five matches enroute to the championship while recording 19 pins. All wins were by fall by the Hounds.
Doherty said there is solid experience outside of Kemper, Smith, and Brandon.  Kat DiPrima recorded four falls at Monday’s event wrestling at 135 lbs. DiPrima comes from Holy Trinity Catholic who shares the program with Fort Madison and Danville.
Brienna Fenton, from Danville, is also off to a good start wrestling at 130 lbs. going 1-0 Monday night with a fall.
Doherty said Tatum Peters (140), Chloe Sokolik (130), and Annah Blanchard (115) all have have more than a year wrestling and have a good summer ramping up to the winter season.
He said he thought the emotion of last year might hurt ambitions this year.
“Going into this year I thought it would be hard to beat the emotion from last year. But after two really hard weeks of practice, we went up to Cardinal and put a pounding on everybody,” he said.
“A lot of stuff we worked on in the summer transferred over into those matches Monday. We had to bump Brienna up at Cardinal and she got two really good wins for us.
“They’re excited. Monday was a good foot in the right direction and we’ve got a busy week this week."
The Hounds travel to Urbandale for a tournament Friday and Saturday.
This year’s roster includes:
100 lbs Hailey Kemper, Lucille Zimmerman, and Emma Berry
115 lbs – Annah Blanchard
120 lbs – Mara Smith
125 lbs – Iris Arevalo, Brienna Fenton
130 lbs-  Chloe Sokolik, Alaina Schwerin
135 lbs. – Kat DiPrima, Natalie Wright
140 lbs. – Tatum Peters
145 lbs – Mady Emmit
155 lbs – Sadie Brandon
235 lbs – Talea Palar