St. Joseph's Meredith Woodhouse sets for a move grabbing the legs of London Central's Nita Rratshi, during the girls' 64-kg gold medal match, at the WOSSAA wrestling championships. (photo / Rob J. Ross)
February 17, 2017
By Rob J. Ross
LONDON, Ont. - They are led by an OFSAA champion who could practice on her younger sister and brother if she wanted too.
The St. Joseph's Lady Rams repeated as team champions at the WOSSAA wrestling tournament, held at Beal Secondary school.
The ladies, winning by almost 30 points and the Rams' boys team placing fourth overall, carried St. Joe's to the combined school title.
"Myself and the other coaches are extremely pleased with how our team did as whole. We have an incredible group of male and female athletes and having the girls repeat as WOSSAA champions is very rewarding for all of us," St. Joe's coach Wolff Schweitzer said.
"It's a culmination of four years of hard work by many of the athletes. The boys' team also took a big step forward this year, scoring enough points to secure the combined title."
The top two in each weight class qualifies for OFSAA, the provincial high school championships, March 1-3 in Brampton, expect for the girls' classes of 41, 44, 83 and 115 kilograms, where it is top three moving on.
Meredith Woodhouse, who last year became St. Joe's first ever OFSAA gold medalist in the sport, led the way winning her 64-kg weight class.
Woodhouse was joined by sister, Sydney (54-kg), Alex Cooper (83-kg) and Mackenzie Miller (115-kg), on top of the podium.
Bringing home silver medals were Nikky Lamframboise (47.5-kg) and Kailey Meehan (51-kg).
Samantha Squires (57.5) took bronze and Chelsie Tiller (57.5-kg) placed fifth.
"All of them wrestled extremely well," Schweitzer said. "Kailey showed a lot of improvement since last year and Samantha showed a lot of improvement this year."
It is almost a year since Meredith won her provincial crown, yet the memories remain fresh.
"It was awesome to be surrounded by so many people with me. My coaches who had been grinding it out with me over the three years I have been wrestling. It was such an empowering moment," recalled Meredith.
She led 8-0 before making a four point move as time expired in the first half but stepped out of bounds. The move didn't count and her coaches wanted to challenge if time did expire before, but if the challenge was lost, she surrenders one point, so she decided not to challenge.
"It was a crazy match. I really wanted to win OFSAA with no one scoring a point on me. I said ‘lets just ready for the second round.' I just picked the girl up and finished it, in bounds."
St. Joseph's Ram team-mates Samantha Squires, left and Chelsie Tiller, fought one another in a 57.5-kg preliminary bout. (photo / Rob J. Ross)
Repeating will present a challenge for Meredith.
"I would love to get back to the OFSAA final, but I haven't been wrestling at the same level as I was last year. I will give my best, put my head down and grind it out hopefully on the way to the final."
Following a pin of Nita Rratshi of London Central, in her gold medal match, Meredith watched her sister defeat Kendall Detaff, of London CCH.
"Seeing Sydney, she puts so much effort in to it and loves it so much. It's so rewarding to see it pay off." I was probably more emotional for her than my own win. I feel she would say the same."
Aidan Woodhouse led the boys' team taking home a silver medal, losing the 44-kg final, to Joel Swartz, of London Saunders, an OFSAA champion last year.
"Our parents got us involved in as many things as they could when we were younger. We were terrible at most things, but we found wrestling and it's been amazing," said Meredith. "You need to think while wrestling. It's not just a brute sport. It's heart and brain. I really like that. It's awesome that it's a sport we can do as a family. We are really close."
Earlier in the day, Cooper and Miller won their respective pools. Cooper felt she had her best wrestling of the season, while Miller's key was paying attention to her opponent's moves.
Tyler Dixon (51-kg) and Jordan Dekort both grabbed a bronze medals. Josh Dekort (77-kg) was fourth and Krystian Krzyzewski (89-kg), fifth.
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