HERSHEY — Two years ago, PIAA Executive Director Dr. Robert Lombardi stopped at Central Dauphin High School following the PIAA Wrestling Championships, then for boys only, in Hershey.
SanctionPA, the grassroots effort to make girls wrestling an official PIAA sport that began in Lancaster County — spearheaded by Penn Manor athletic director Pat Tocci, McCaskey athletic director Jon Mitchell, McCaskey coach Kevin Franklin and Dr. Brooke Zumas, a coach for the Parkland girls team — was running the My House State Girls Championships.
As Lombardi watched the competition from above, he offered the following thoughts to LNP:
“I like the way it is being done. It’s being done at a grassroots level to show it’s not a fad. It’s a sport being taken seriously.
“We are training, we have coaching, we have officiating, we have participants that are moving on to the next levels, then coming back and giving back. So it is that cycle that I think is going to work, and we are supporting that.”
Last Saturday night as the inaugural PIAA Wrestling Championships to include girls began to wind down, Lombardi again found time to speak exclusively to LNP. As he did, he looked onto the floor, where the girls had center stage, nestled between the Class 3A and 2A boys, and smiled.
“We wanted to highlight them, especially being the first year, and it took some work, but I think we hit it right on the nut,” Lombardi said. “Friday night, it was nice that we had about 7,800 here. It was a good experience. You could feel the place come alive again, and I think the girls helped bring that in here.”
Then he added, not only about the 26 wrestling for gold (many nationally ranked) but the 182 girls from 116 schools around Pennsylvania who also took to the mats over the weekend:
“I think they did a great job,” he said. “They should be complimented. So should their coaches and communities. I know we may have been slow to some people’s liking, but we were deliberate because we have a process. I think what we have now is concrete and not going to break. I think our foundation here is just going to springboard and only get better.”
Hempfield coach Alan Houck called it a positive weekend for the wrestling community.
He agreed with Lombardi and said having three of his kids’ arms raised, including Hattie Mack — the first from the Lancaster Lebanon League to win a medal — can only help grow the sport at Hempfield and in Lancaster County.
“We talked many years ago that we wanted to plant the flag, for people to know we are here from Hempfield, and we did,” Houck said. “As a team, they excelled. To have three girls, our first year, get here and do what they did, we did something right. To hear everyone cheering when the girls hit the mats was a great thing. There were some hiccups, but I think the PIAA did a great job putting them in the middle and showing the commitment to where the PIAA is. It has been a positive experience.”
When first approached by SanctionPA — with the idea of making the sport official a few years back — Lombardi said the PIAA was hopeful it would happen. But he also knew it would take a group effort, like the one spearheaded by SanctionPA.
“Folks like Jon Mitchell, Brooke Zumas and Pat Tocci, they said, ‘Look, there is not only a need, but there is desire,’ ” Lombardi said. “We have to mine it. And they helped guide us a little bit, and we helped guide them because the information they put out was accurate. There were no rumors, innuendos or falsehoods, so people didn’t have false hope. I think everyone working together showed we can do it,”
Tocci, who had one of his girls from Penn Manor, Brooklynn Ayala, medal at 235, couldn’t have been happier.
“I think it is unbelievably exciting,” Tocci said. “Being a former coach who has coached here, being an athlete who wrestled here, having two sons who wrestled here and medaled, I think that is what this effort is. We know how great of an experience it is. And that is what makes it so wonderful. That girls now get to experience what we got to experience.
“We have seen a packed Giant Center. A great atmosphere and I think everybody thought it was a good experience. I think this exceeded what we thought at the time. I think the PIAA has to get a lot of credit for bringing the girls into the Giant Center and also to their wrestling steering committee. They gave us the road map. And that was good because we built a good product from the bottom up.”
Gettysburg coach Chris Haines, a huge advocate of the SanctionPA movement, was also one of the first to get a program going in the state. Saturday he got to sit in the chair and watch as daughter Zoey won gold.
“With the PIAA being involved on this stage and this arena, it is a huge impact for the sport of wrestling and a huge step for women’s wrestling,” Haines said. “I discussed with (PIAA chief operating officer) Mark Byers earlier today, that in the semifinals it hadn’t been since the old ‘Barn’ (Hersheypark Arena) that we had the kind of excitement that we have had here.
“I’m just so grateful for everyone who has been involved in SanctionPA, the PIAA, and all the schools who jumped in and unknowingly helped push this sport forward.”
As the champions posed for a historic photo following the event, Zumas watched and got emotional, realizing how far girls wrestling had come. It was a far cry from when she sat at a table in the concourse during the 2020 boys championships, passing out brochures.
“Going into this weekend, we were obviously excited about having the girls here, but within that excitement, there were also questions as to how it would go,” Zumas said. “I think it really went well. With the format we did, it went smoothly.
“Every boy and girl got attention and visibility from more people, which is really a great thing in this sport. And it exceeded expectations. There are so many emotions. It’s hard to capture because this whole weekend has been pure joy and excitement because you know that is why you did this journey.”
And as for the journey Zumas spoke about? Franklin was nothing but smiles as well.
Not only because of the PIAA’s success but also because of what his ‘Journie,’ as in Rodriguez, had accomplished. The junior 112-pounder from McCaskey, the first school to recognize girls wrestling in Pennsylvania, brought home the first gold medal for the L-L.
“I think the weekend was probably the best sequence of wrestling she had done all year,” Franklin said. “When you go from wrestling all boys to all girls, there are some fundamental differences. But she executed everything perfectly. I’m trying to still run back all the history we witnessed this weekend.
“I think walking in it hits you, then you go into coach mode, trying to execute all the X’s and O’s, and now at the end, it hits you. These girls are walking out with bonafide PIAA gold medals, all the way down to eighth place. And the league, was represented well there. There are a lot of girls outside of JP McCaskey I worked with, just a great weekend.”
Lombardi said he wasn’t surprised the weekend was a success. But what he was surprised with was how the fans embraced it.
“I wasn’t surprised at their skill level,” Lombardi said. “They really added a lot of energy to the tournament. I was surprised at how the general public embraced it, and that has really helped our wrestling community.
“All of us are proud of this. Our staff is. All of our steering committee folks. I hope the coaches and our schools, the athletic directors and principals who worked so hard to make our rules the schools want are as well.”
