(Story by Stephen McDaniel)
The ascension of the Ankeny girls’ wrestling program has been a quick one.
In the span of just three seasons, Ankeny went from placing 40th as a team in its first year, leaping up to seventh place last year and finishing the 2024-25 season as the Class 2A team runner-up on Friday night at Xtream Arena in Coralville.
The level of talent throughout the roster built up by Ankeny, Ankeny Centennial, North Polk and Bondurant-Farrar athletes has only increased in the program’s short existence.
Ankeny more than doubled its amount of placewinners from last season, helping the team rack up 57 more points to become the Class 2A runner-up with 143 points in the first season with two classes for girls’ wrestling. Raccoon River-Northwest won the title with 156 points.
“I’m super proud of our girls,” said Ankeny coach Dustin Roland. “I’d rather walk home with second place with this team than walk out of here as a champion with any other team. Our goal was to bring home a team trophy and we did that, so we’re pretty happy about that.”
The quest to bring a team title home was spoiled by top-ranked Raccoon River-Northwest, which stood as Class 2A’s first team champions after being tied for second overall a year ago with East Buchanan, which captured the Class 1A crown on Friday.
Haylee McGrew, Hayden Bratland and Nora Bockes were Ankeny’s lone placewinners last season. That trio was not only a part of Ankeny’s seven total placewinners this season, but also accounted for three of its four state finalists.
For McGrew and Bratland, contending for titles hasn’t been anything new. McGrew finished as the state runner-up as a junior at 155 pounds, while Bratland placed third at 140 as a freshman. So another year older and wiser, it was not so surprising to the Ankeny team that the top-seeded duo found themselves in the state finals after dominant seasons.
Bratland avenged her semifinal loss against Shaylee Sutherland of Spencer as a freshman by recording a 10-0 major decision to become the Class 2A state champion at 140. She recorded bonus points the whole way through the bracket with two major decisions and two falls.
“I remember working in the practice room with all my teammates and being like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe how far we’ve come in this program,’” said Bratland, who finished at 42-1. “All of us work so hard, and I’m really excited to see us come as far as we have.”
McGrew was on the hunt for a perfect season and made it back to the state finals at 155 by collecting three falls leading up to the title match.
But fate had different plans in her finals matchup with No. 2 Amalia Djoumessi of Waverly-Shell Rock.
An early shot by Djoumessi ended up tweaking one of McGrew’s ankles, and the Ankeny senior found herself trailing by a 6-0 margin. She managed a reversal and while trying to turn her for a pin, Djoumessi slipped away and caught McGrew on her back for the fall in 1 minute 45 seconds.
It was a heart-breaking end for McGrew, who lost for the first time in 34 matches this season. But her impact on the team is way more than any hardware.
“It was a fun go and a couple of fun years,” McGrew said after her final state tournament run. “Sophomore year I was in Des Moines, but Ankeny just feels like family. I’m really glad my senior year was here with Ankeny.”
“I hope that as she leaves our program, she knows that for the rest of her life she’s got (me and assistant coach Michael Tarin), along with the rest of our staff as well, but two guys that’ve been with her since day one that would, as my dad would say, ‘Crawl 1,000 miles if she needed a nickel,’” Roland added.
Bockes was the only other placewinner besides McGrew and Bratland when she placed seventh at 110 a year ago. Elyse Engebretson was a state qualifier, but didn’t end up placing after a short tournament appearance.
Now both were contending for crowns alongside Ankeny’s title contenders coming into the season.
Engebretson officially entered the history books as the program’s first-ever state champion as the North Polk senior knocked off the No. 3 and 2 seeds as the No. 6 seed before pinning No. 5 Anna O’Rear of West Delaware in 3:46 in the title match at 125. She finished at 44-5.
Her journey with the Ankeny program is very similar to the trajectory the program itself has taken over the past few years.
The Ankeny coaching staff takes much pride in seeing Engebretson’s evolution as raw talent and refining it to the point where she took the massive leap from being just a state qualifier to their first-ever state champion.
“Deciding what I’m doing on the weekends during the spring, like I’m a softball player, so it sucks to miss out on Fargo and stuff,” Engebretson said about how much went into her growth. “Then dedicating the rest of my fall to preseason practicing. It’s not tough, but everyone wants to do that work.”
Bockes herself had a long journey after a season of dealing with injuries and having to miss some time from competing on the mat.
Yet her state tournament run saw her pin the No. 4 seed as the No. 5 seed, then gut out a tough ultimate tiebreaker in the semifinals against December Paw of Des Moines Public Schools.
The finals match, much like McGrew’s, didn’t pan out in her favor. No. 3 Ashlyn Leslie of Nevada caught Bockes in a bad spot for a fall in the first period, ending her season at 20-10.
The only other state qualifiers that Ankeny returned for this season were Lauren Watson and Trudy Haag. Both of them went from not placing to earning spots on the podium as No. 6 seeds.
Watson suffered a 10-5 loss in the opening round and responded by making a run through the consolations to reach the third-place match at 105.
During the consolation semifinals, Watson even trailed as much as 13-3 against No. 3 Joslyn Swanson of Hinton before getting a second-period reversal that led her to pin Swanson in 3:57.
Watson pulled a similar move against No. 5 Nora Ohnemus of Indianola in the bronze match by giving up a takedown, but turning it into a reversal and a fall for a third-place finish. She ended the year at 33-12.
“Last two days, Lauren was sick and maybe at one point, we didn’t know if she’d wrestle in this tournament,” Roland said. “Day one, didn’t look good, but gutted out two matches after dropping the first-round match. Coming back today, winning a few more and finishing third after losing the first-round match is one of the toughest things you can do.”
Haag was Ankeny’s fifth semifinalist, but was the only one to not reach the finals after dropping a 10-0 major decision to No. 2 Avaeh Smith of Lewis Central, the eventual champion.
After losing by fall in the consolation semifinals, Haag rebounded with a 10-4 decision over No. 5 Tegan Robertson of Ridge View in the fifth-place match. Haag held a 4-3 lead going into the third period and clinched it with a takedown and a near fall, raising her final record to 40-8.
There’s a lot to be excited about in the future for Ankeny with plenty of wrestlers coming up the pipeline, which includes an interesting trio of freshmen that got their first taste of the state tournament.
Jammie Krah was a standout for Ankeny at 145 and placed seventh in Class 2A with a pin over No. 4 Ayla Osterkamp of Dubuque Hempstead in 2:59. She finished at 34-11.
Zoe Sullivan (100) and Kaylie Staples (235) both had quick appearances as No. 12 seeds in their respective brackets, but both stand out as two potential mainstays for the team in years to come.
“First state champions in the history of Ankeny girls’ wrestling and the first of many more to come,” Roland said. “Coming from 40th two years ago and only having seven wrestlers between the two schools the year before that to a runner-up finish and wrestling darn-near as well as we possibly could have this weekend. Just blessed to be a part of this program with a great coaching staff, great administration and even better athletes.”
