Girls’ wrestling is on the cusp of being sanctioned by the PIAA. Here’s where it stands.

Brooke Zumas believes wrestling has the power to change girls’ lives.

Zumas, who once coached boys and girls at Parkland High School near Allentown, still remembers a father’s poignant story about waiting to pick up his daughter from practice.

“He saw one girl walk out and he said, ‘Wow, she seems confident,’” Zumas recalled during a recent phone interview. “Then he realized it was his daughter. It didn’t hit him at first. He wasn’t used to seeing her carry herself like that.”

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Zumas, now the president of SanctionPA, a nonprofit organization working to grow participation in the sport, hopes more parents will soon see similar changes in their daughters.

Last month, SanctionPA formally applied to the PIAA, which governs high school sports in the commonwealth, to officially sanction girls’ wrestling.

An affirmative vote at a Feb. 22 board meeting, Zumas said, brought the goal closer to reality. Two more positive votes still are required, however, before an official ruling can be made.

Another meeting is scheduled for May, the earliest a final decision could occur.

Zumas said her organization, which formed in 2020, is confident girls’ wrestling will be approved. The second part of the equation is less certain.

“In that [final] vote, they would also state when it would become a sport,” she said. “Everyone is waiting on pins and needles to see when they would approve for … obviously the hope from the wrestling community is that [the PIAA] will take jurisdiction immediately for the next season and there will be a [girls’] PIAA championship in the 2023-2024 season. … In addition to the jubilance of, hopefully, becoming a sanctioned sport, there will be this other reaction related to the start date.”

Zumas’ love for wrestling began when she was a little girl. She attended Lehigh University wrestling matches with her father, Nick, who graduated from the school in 1970. Her dad, now 74, didn’t wrestle at Lehigh but passed his love for the sport to his daughter.

He even taught her moves in the family’s basement. The problem was, Zumas had nowhere to use those skills. Her high school, Moravian Academy, only had a boys’ wrestling team.

Perhaps that’s why Zumas was undeterred when SanctionPA learned the PIAA requirement for sanctioning a new sport was 100 teams. There were zero girls’ wrestling teams in the state at the time.

In March 2020, McCaskey High School in Lancaster became the first to add girls’ wrestling as an official sport. Last month, nearly three years later, Pennridge became the 100th. There are now more than 100 schools, and Zumas hopes for more.

To formally add girls’ wrestling at each school, Zumas explained that each district school board had to make a motion to officially recognize the sport, which then had to be approved. She also said there was no limit placed on the number of girls needed to field a “team.”

Unsanctioned girls’ wrestling championships have occurred in the state since at least 1999. The state chapter of USA Wrestling, Zumas said, often has overseen the competitions.

In fact, the championships have grown to resemble formal PIAA events, Zumas said, in an attempt to show the events could fit within official PIAA confines.

The girls’ regional championships occurred March 5 at four venues across the state. The unsanctioned state championship will take place Sunday at Central Dauphin High School.

For Zumas, who worked as a freelance wrestling photographer while earning a doctorate in psychology, the sport is about more than first-place medals and championships.

“I think, as it grows, there will be more awareness that it’s a great sport for anybody,” she said. “Literally any body, any size, any background, any disability. Girls who love theater, girls who play other sports, girls who have never played a sport and wouldn’t define themselves as athletic, girls who are in student government, girls who aren’t involved in anything at their schools. I think who wrestles can be misunderstood and how much it can positively impact lives is definitely misunderstood. I would encourage anybody who is interested to at least try it.”