Lying face-first on the ground, body intertwined with a boy from Deerfield, freshman Kate Abrams aggressively wrestles her way back up to a standing position.

To many people, a girl wrestling a boy may seem like an uncomfortable situation. For Abrams, wrestling against boys is no longer as “awkward” as it was at the start of the season.

“When you’re wrestling, you’re not thinking, ‘Oh, I’m wrestling a guy,’ or ‘Oh, I’m wrestling a girl,’” said Abrams. “You’re thinking, ‘I have to figure out this move, and I have to make it work.’”

Freshman Casey Mutchnik wrestles Abrams in practice and said he agrees it is important to focus on technique when out on the mat.

“It’s slightly uncomfortable, but you kind of just have to put that out of the way,” Mutchnik said.

Abrams’ teammates have been very supportive of her being the only girl on the team.

“It’s really cool that she’s wrestling,” said freshman Joey Harris. “She’s just on the team. It’s nothing weird to any of us.”

Abrams said one of her favorite memories with her team was on picture day.

“We all wear singlets, which are kind of like leotards, but they cover more area,” said Abrams. “They’ve got shorts and a tank top type of thing, but they are kind of awkward to be in. So, during picture day we all had to put on the singlets to try them on. … We were parading down the hall in a line of awkward teenagers wearing singlets trying to get our picture taken so we could just go and take them off.”

According to Frank Whalen, freshman wrestling head coach, one barrier Abrams has to face is being “physically overmatched.”

“She keeps showing up, and she keeps battling,” said Whalen. “I know she has earned my respect by her ability to hang in there. … Wrestling is very difficult, and for her to hang in and keep a good attitude and keep coming back every day, boy or girl, that is how you earn your teammates’ respect. She has done that.”

After 10 years of experience in martial arts, Abrams said she became intrigued by the Glenbrook North wrestling program.

“Some moves are the same,” said Abrams. “Sometimes the body moves the same way. But, wrestling is a really different sport. It’s really, really intense and really difficult compared to a lot of the martial arts that I have done. … You’ve got to be really, really devoted to the sport in order to be good. You can’t just go three times a week and hope to be good.”

Abrams said she believes the referees treat her and the boys equally.

“I think they have seen girls in the sport before, and I think they are used to it by now,” Abrams said.

Harris, however, had a different experience with a referee when he was wrestling against a girl in a match.

“I felt like the [referee] treated it like a different situation,” said Harris. “He just was like yelling at me for [being aggressive and] doing stuff that we were doing to guys.”

According to Whalen, everyone who signs up to wrestle needs to have the expectation that he or she may compete against someone of the opposite sex.

“Gender has no bearing on how your opponent should approach their match or their competition,” Whalen said.

Abrams said she agreed that gender should not affect one’s attitude going into a match.

“When you get out on that mat to compete, you are not a girl or boy anymore,” said Abrams. “You are a wrestler, and your goal is to win.”