Oceanside High School alum Maddie Ripley has had a successful postgraduate season at Wyoming Seminary in Pennsylvania, with hopes of wrestling at the college level next season. Photo courtesy of Wyoming Seminary Wrestling

Maddie Ripley made an indelible mark in Maine high school wrestling, becoming the first girl to win an individual state wrestling championship while competing against boys.

The trailblazing wrestler from Rockland, who repeated the feat last season for Oceanside High, is a postgraduate student at Wyoming Seminary, a wrestling prep power in Forty Fort, Pennsylvania.

And she’s continuing to impress on the mats.

Competing against college wrestlers, Ripley finished fourth in the 110-pound division at the Ken Kraft Midlands Championships in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, last month. In November, she won the 110-pound title at the East Stroudsburg Open in East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania.

Both events featured elite wrestlers from across the country.

“Maddie is great,” said Wyoming Seminary girls wrestling coach Bret Fry. “Aside from her wrestling skills, she’s one of the most likable kids we’ve had at Sem. That’s the first impression that jumps out: she’s a sweetheart of a kid. The progress that she’s made since she’s been here is unreal. … To win the East Stroudsburg, as a high schooler, that’s a pretty big deal. And she did it in dominant fashion, too — it wasn’t even close. She’s a great student, good on campus. I wish we had 10 more Maddie Ripleys here, to be honest with you.”

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Wyoming Seminary features the top-ranked boys and girls wrestling programs in the nation, according to USA Wrestling. Both programs swept the National Prep Championships last season. The Blue Knights have won three national championships since its girls program’s debut in 2017.

“We’re definitely happy she came here,” said Cornell Robinson, the Director of Wrestling and boys head coach at Wyoming Seminary. “She’s definitely a hard worker.”

Maddie Ripley enjoyed a standout wrestling career at Oceanside High. Now she is competing at Wyoming Seminary, a prep power in Pennsylvania. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

Ripley, who primarily wrestled boys at Oceanside High, strictly competes against girls at Wyoming Seminary. She said she doesn’t miss competing against boys.

“It’s honestly really nice to be fully switched over, full time, only wrestling girls, and having a team of girls (to compete with),” Ripley said. “A lot of them have come from the same situation (as me). We have a really good team.”

Ripley moved to Pennsylvania in August, and quickly got to work with the team, which features 17 female wrestlers.

“We pretty much had the first week to ourselves,” Ripley said. “After that, we (have practiced) every single day. We wrestle the whole season, but our (regular) season started two weeks ago, but we wrestle in offseason tournaments.”

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The success hasn’t come easy, because Ripley has had to learn a new style of wrestling.

There are three different wrestling styles commonly seen in the United States: Folkstyle, freestyle and Greco-Roman. Folkstyle, which awards wrestlers points for control over an opponent during a match, is used in Maine high school wrestling. Referees can also stop the action if they feel a wrestler went too far in throwing an opponent.

Maddie Ripley, top, wrestles against Brooklynn Webber of Mt. Blue in the 107-pound finals of the 2023 Maine state girls wrestling championships at Wells High. Gregory Rec/Portland Press Herald

Ripley and some of her teammates are adjusting to freestyle wrestling, which allows throws. Wrestlers are also awarded more points for executing moves compared to staying in control. Freestyle wrestling typically leads to faster matches.

“All of us started (wrestling) when we were very young,” Ripley said. “The difference is, they’ve done freestyle their whole lives. A couple of the seniors are new to it. We’re all starting (freestyle) differently. In Maine, I never tied up (with an opponent during a match), I was not about that hand-fighting stuff. Here, you need to know how to hand fight, because that’s how you score 90 percent of the time. With these girls at the higher level, you can’t shoot in (on an opponent’s legs) and take them down, because their hips are so strong.

“I definitely feel I’ve progressed with my freestyle stuff. There’s been a lot of learning of what not to do. Not exposing your back. I was pretty scrambly while doing folkstyle in Maine, and it was hard to break that habit. I’ve really been working on tie-ups, because you just need to learn that (to be successful).”

Ripley is still aiming to one day compete at the Olympics. But before that, she hopes to wrestle for a top collegiate program. She has not yet declared which school she plans to attend.

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Ripley will be entering her collegiate career at an exciting time. This month, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) declared women’s wrestling as its 91st championship sport, recognized for Divisions I, II and III.

“I think that’s awesome,” Ripley said. “I think it was a good idea to wait a year (before starting college).”

“Maddie and her generation, they’re kind of the first one where coaches are really donating a lot of time to female wrestlers,” Fry said. “She’s a pioneer in that regard. A lot of the work she and her generation have put into women’s wrestling, has put (the sport) in the position where more colleges will start adopting women’s programs, at DIs, DIIs and DIIIs.”

Wherever Ripley goes to school, Fry is confident she’ll be successful.

“She’s already demonstrated that she can compete at the highest college level right now,” he said. “Wherever she decides to go to college, she will make the podium as a freshman. You can quote me on that. She’ll make the podium as a college freshman, if not near the top.”

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