Donate your Old Mats!
by Dr. TJ Zito, Jr
As Alabama progresses towards sanctioning girls’ wrestling, it is a state goal for new girls’ programs to declare an official team and participate in AHSAA girls’ events. When new wrestling teams begin, it is an excellent growth opportunity for schools to start both boys’ and girls’ teams simultaneously.
Adding girls to a new program can help the numbers double in size and increase a team’s footprint with student participation. More wrestlers create additional kids selling the story in the school. The kids are always the best salespeople telling their classmates about how wrestling is fun. Having girls and boys on a team doubles the number of kids talking about wrestling and promoting the sport to their friends.
Finding a mat is one of the toughest obstacles to starting a high school program from scratch. It can also be very difficult for new programs to afford to purchase a new or used mat.
The Alabama Wrestling Hall of Fame has a unique sponsorship where its members purchase mats and loan them to new programs that are declared with the state. When the team grows and purchases a mat of its own, the Hall of Fame mat is then moved to another new school that declares its official entry to the state for participation. The mat continues life, always helping the next new program grow.
The Alabama Girls Wrestling Alliance will partner with the Alabama Chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame to help with their fundraising activities. We believe that helping the Hall purchase and distribute mats to new programs can help wrestling grow both boys’ and girls’ programs in the state of Alabama.
To meet the state’s goal to increase declared girls’ programs, we feel it is essential to support all opportunities for new boys’ and girls’ teams.
Thank you, Hall of Famers Billy Hughes and Randy Haught, for reminding us
APWB- Always Pay Wrestling Back
We were happy to work out a deal with the Hall of Fame for our old mat at John Carroll Catholic High School. In the spring of 2019, We purchased the “Big Green Mat” from Pelham High School to start our boys’ and girls’ program from scratch.
Two seasons ago, Catholic Wrestle 501c3 purchased a new EZ Flex mat for our team to use, and our old Pelham mat owned by John Carroll was in storage.
Randy and Billy’s Mat Program was a perfect opportunity for us to pass the ‘Big Green Mat” on to a school that needs it. John Carroll High is excited the mat will always be used to start new programs.
We wish Brewer High School the best of luck and were excited to discuss their new boys’ and girls’ programs.
We will drive from Birmingham to Brewer this season with our girls’ and boys’ teams for the first-ever “Battle for the Mat.” Randy and Billy with the Hall of Fame created a fun, new rivalry between our teams!