Cassy Herkelman of Cedar Falls wins wrestling match, sort of…..

Cassy Herkelman is a wrestler at Cedar Falls High School in Cedar Falls, Iowa.

She made Iowa wrestling history Thursday when she became the first female wrestler to win a match at a state tournament. The problem is she won the match by default. She pinned her opponent on a moral dilemma rather than a physical move.

Joel Northrup was set to be her opponent in the match, but he refused to wrestle her on moral grounds that quite frankly are hard to argue with. It is important to note that Northrup wasn’t a kid that was afraid of losing to a “girl”, Northrup is a top ranked wrestler and he would have won the match EASILY!

Joel Northrup may be a politician someday as he used the following words to describe his decision…….

“I have a tremendous amount of respect for Cassy and Megan and their accomplishments. However, wrestling is a combat sport and it can get violent at times. As a matter of conscience and my faith I do not believe that it is appropriate for a boy to engage a girl in this manner. It is unfortunate that I have been placed in a situation not seen in most other high school sports in Iowa.”

To make matters worse for Northrup, he now has to wrestle in the consolation bracket where he may be scheduled against another female wrestler Megan Black, where he will surely refuse that match as well.

Cassy Herkelman should be proud of her hard work to make it to the tournament, but Northrup should never have been put in this position. He had a real shot at winning it all and it is sad that it was taken away from him by the politically correct environment that exists today.