Alexis Wilcher keeps opponents off their toes
February 9, 2009
By Jeff Richards
Skyline junior Alexis Wilcher (top) wrestles an opponent at the Lady Wolfpack Invite Jan. 31 at Henry M. Jackson High School in Mill Creek. She placed first at the all-female tournament in the 140-pound weight class. Photo by Dave Jedlicka
Skyline High School junior Alexis Wilcher has a knack for pinning boys.
By any other measure, she’s your typical teenage girl. She enjoys riding horses and hanging out with friends, and at 5 foot 4, she certainly isn’t the tallest.
But every winter since seventh grade, Wilcher has donned a spandex singlet and headgear, stepped onto the wrestling mat and pitted her skills against what usually turns out to be members of the opposite sex.
“I hear it all the time that wrestling a girl is awkward for guys,” she said. “But when you step out on the mat, gender goes out the window. It’s just another meet.”
Wilcher is in her second year competing with the Skyline wrestling team.
Wrestling in the 140-pound class this year, she has a 4-1 junior varsity record, with all four wins coming from pins. Her varsity record is 1-2.
She came to Skyline after moving to Snoqualmie from Colorado with her mother. She’d been wrestling for three years prior to joining the team and quickly showed she belonged on the team, wrestling coach Gus Kiss said.
“She proved herself in practice and on the mat,” he said. “She wrestled some men really tough.”
When Wilcher first joined the team, Kiss addressed his wrestlers and instructed them on how they were to treat her.
“I stood in front of them and told them, ‘Inside practice, she’s a teammate, and outside of practice, you treat her like a lady,’” he said.
Wilcher said she’s had no trouble fitting in with her teammates, who treat her just like one of the guys, and a few have become some of her best friends.
It wasn’t always so easy for her, though. When she wrestled in Colorado, teammates there had a different way of letting her fit in — not at all.
“They beat me up,” she said. “They were definitely rougher on me than on anyone else.”
She persevered through that and when her mother, Jude Wilcher, was looking to move, she eyed the Pacific Northwest as a welcoming environment.
“I suspected that the Northwest would be the right place to be,” Jude said. “I was convinced the culture would be encouraging of her.”
Wilcher said the uphill battle to be accepted and succeed in wrestling has given her strength in all aspects of life.
“I don’t think I’d be the person I am today without wrestling,” she said. “The persistence you need and the drive to succeed in it really shapes everything you do.”
Wilcher still has room to improve as a wrestler. Though it is difficult to find girls to wrestle, when she does, Kiss said she seems to attack with a little more aggressiveness and confidence than when she wrestles boys.
“I think she’s smart enough to realize that ‘Gee, they’re a little stronger than me,’” he said. “With girls, she seems to be more focused, because she doesn’t want to get beat by any girls.”
Last year, she took second place at the girls 3A state championship in the 145-pound class.
Just recently, she took first place in the 140-pound weight class at the Lady Wolfpack Invite at Henry M. Jackson High School in Mill Creek.
It was her first time competing against fellow female wrestlers this year. She pinned her first two opponents before taking the finals by a 12-2 score.
Wilcher’s career in wrestling began with a friendly dare in the seventh grade, but has since blossomed into a true passion. Still, she said she doesn’t think she wants to continue wrestling in college.
Instead, she plans to study civil engineering at the University of Washington after her high-school graduation.
The plan is to follow in the footsteps of her mother, an urban transportation planner for the city of Seattle, and someone who Wilcher said has been a huge inspiration and encouraging influence.
“She doesn’t push me hard. She pushes me hard enough,” she said. “She gets up early in the morning to help me make weight. I mean who else would do that?”
Wilcher won her first match in the seventh grade by a pin with five seconds left to go until the end of the match.
When the referee raised her arm as the winner, Wilcher said all of her middle school classmates rose in the bleachers.
They don’t get so excited anymore. Now, it’s just another pin, no different than the many others she’s earned.
Reach intern Jeff Richards at 392-6434, ext. 236, or samrev@isspress.com. Comment on this story at www.SammamishReview.com.
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