Ashland hoping its girls wrestling program can be an example as sport continues growing

ASHLAND - The only girl in the wrestling room wasn't bothered.

Ashland's Nora Quitt began wrestling at age seven. Her father Adam Quitt, who wrestled in the Marine Corps and later fought in professional mixed martial arts bouts, showed her moves in the basement before taking her to a tournament in Springfield. Seven matches later hooked her.

"I love the adrenaline, I love the whole atmosphere of it," Nora Quitt said. "I just wanted to keep going. I remember after each match, I just wanted to keep going."

She took it to the top. Quitt won a girls all-state championship last season topped the podium at the Eastern States classic earlier this month. For most of her rise, she trained with and wrestled against boys.

"Because I started so young. It didn't really bother me a whole lot. When I got into high school, I had my days," Nora Quitt said after Wednesday's Coaches vs. Cancer match against Hopkinton. "I do girl things. I would feel awkward sometimes. The guys have their own cliques. Everyone was very supportive, and everyone's been very kind to me, but I had my ups and downs and moments where I don't feel like I belong."

Another way

Adam Quitt saw what Nora went through and considered another option. Most sports like basketball, lacrosse, cross-country et al separate boys and girls teams. Why not bring more girls in to try and create that in Ashland?

"She had no opportunity to wrestle girls. It was just the boys. I wanted it separate," Adam said. "I just think it’s too much, especially for high school girls who have never wrestled, to throw them into an all-boys room."

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Ashland coach Pete Zacchilli embraced the idea. The Clockers started an all-girls wrestling room this season under the umbrella of the boys program. To do that, though, they needed girls. Nora and her younger sister Raina Quitt made fliers, hosted interest meetings and recruited over social media.

"Girls who say don't make the basketball team, don't make swimming, whatever, they can have this sport," Nora Quitt said. "They can come in and try something new and be awesome."

The Quitts emphasized there's no experience necessary and invited everyone to try. They eventually amassed a group of eight newcomers along with Nora to have nine girls in the program.

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Angeline Nommi is friends with Raina and joined through her.

"I thought it would be nice to try a new sport, and I really grew to like it," Nommi said. "You create good sportsmanship. It's very physical, it's a way to deal with everything. It comes from the heart."

Girls captain Carly Larson boxed at Upper Cuts in Ashland and noticed a large crossover between the boxers and wrestlers. She played field hockey with Raina and saw the opportunity to join the wrestling program.

"I was always hesitant about it as a girl," Larson said. "It was always something I wanted to do, now here's an actual opportunity for me to do it."

'You've got to create the opportunity'

While Nora is one of the captains of the boys team, the girls team primarily wrestles in junior varsity matches mostly against boys. They placed 25th out of 52 teams at the All Girls Classic at Mahar Regional in Orange this January, an event that brought 154 girls wrestlers together from all over the northeast.

The Clockers also hosted a girls only dual right before Christmas with Oliver Ames and Milford, which Zacchilli believed was the first of its kind in MetroWest.

"It’s the greatest sport in the world. I mean, it teaches life skills, so how or why are we only catering to half the population?" Zacchilli said. "You're creating kids that are ready to take on life and life’s challenges. That's what the sport of wrestling does. You've got to make it more available for kids to grow through that."

Framingham also has "six or seven" girls in its program, while most others in the area have a handful. Lowell approached girls wrestling similarly to Ashland and has 10 girls on its roster, while Boston has provided opportunities for all-girls meets at Boston Latin and Excel Academy.

Ashland's goal is to build an entire girls roster that can compete in girls duals and tournaments as often as its boys team in an all-girls league. The Clockers aren't there yet from a funding standpoint but embrace the challenge of making it a reality.

"The more teams that do that in the area, the more the sport will grow," Zacchilli said. "Wrestling is the fastest growing girls sport in the nation. You've got to create the opportunity."

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For now, the Clockers are focused on the girls All-State championship. There were 72 teams represented last year, and Adam Quitt expects even more in 2024. Nora Quitt is the state's top-ranked wrestler at 138 pounds. Even if she wins another championship, she wants her legacy at Ashland to contain more than trophies.

"I think it's really, really special. I think we're really fortunate right now to have everyone together. It's a really powerful thing. It shows that this sport is growing as a gender neutral sport. I'm really happy for these girls. They've put a lot of work, and they're having a lot of fun, and it's just as just a great thing that's happening," Nora Quitt said. "I hope the girls grow a lot more like I did, and they stick with it, and they get there they get more girls to join as well. Hopefully it grows, and if it does, that'd be my greatest accomplishment leaving here."

Contact Kyle Grabowski at kgrabowski@gannett.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @kylegrbwsk.

This article originally appeared on MetroWest Daily News: Nora Quitt paved the way for Ashland girls wrestling program