BILLINGS — Stepping onto the wrestling mat for her first practice was nerve-racking. Of course, it was.
Emily Ples is a cross country and track runner and a dancer, and played basketball in middle school. She wasn’t a pugilist.
But there she was, nearly two weeks into the 2023-24 wrestling season, strapping on the headgear for the first time in her life without one iota of knowledge about a single-leg takedown, a cradle or an ankle pick.
How did Ples, who began the wrestling season her sophomore year at Red Lodge High School as a team manager at the request of Rams coach Hoke Lytton, get in this predicament?
Ples came to be on the mat because a few days earlier, when there wasn’t much for a manager to do, she watched the wrestlers practice their throws. Suddenly, a thought crossed her mind: “I want to be able to throw someone like that.”
She talked it over with her mother, Bonnie, and the next Monday at school Ples told Lytton she wanted to wrestle with the team, not manage it. Lytton, who said he’ll never turn a kid away, welcomed the switch, and Ples’ wrestling education began.
“I didn’t even know how to take a shot,” Ples acknowledged.
Ples quickly realized she was way out of her comfort zone. And maybe over her head. Experience matters in wrestling, and she had none. But Ples holds Lytton in high regard — it’s why she took the manager gig in the first place — and she knew she couldn’t back out, couldn’t let him or the team down.
Coaches and teammates showed tremendous patience with her. Ples owed it to them not go back on her word to wrestle.
She stuck it out, and her first official match came and went, just like that. Ples was taken down to the mat and pinned in under 30 seconds. Even with that inglorious result, Bonnie told her daughter, “That was so cool!”
Oddly, Ples thought so, too.
“That’s when I was like, ‘this is my sport,’“ she said.
It took about 10 matches to earn her first win that season, a pin that was her only victory as a sophomore.
By junior year, she’d set her sights on placing at divisionals and qualifying for state. To encourage her pursuit, Lytton and coach Jake Grove said they’d dye their hair blue if she qualified. She did, and they did, though a bout with the flu just before state undercut her chances. Ples didn’t win a match at state, but simply walking in the parade of athletes at the tournament was special enough for her.
Now in her senior year, Ples wants to get at least one win on the state mats. And along the way, she wants to continue to make Red Lodge’s wrestling room kind to newcomers, like it was for her. Lytton said she has.
“She’s a great team leader,” he said. “She leads by example. The intangible of that is very powerful.”
Ples joked about the irony of finding wrestling so late, but there were times she’d wonder how many more wins she might have if she had as much mat time as some of her opponents. Ples said she sometimes “cursed” her parents for not putting her into a wrestling program when she was little.
But the timing is what it is, and Ples is comfortable with her nearly three-year wrestling window.
So is Lytton.
“She's coachable, has an amazing attitude, and she's intrinsically motivated,” he said. “It makes a huge difference when kids have goals, and I feel like she was able to apply those goals to this sport.
“It was really tough sledding. I reminded her that the waves were going to crash over for a little bit until she found her way and developed some technique and became more and more aggressive. And she just continues to work hard to do that.”
If nothing else, Ples said, the lessons she’s learned along her wrestling journey will help her overcome the hurdles of a what will be a challenging pre-med workload at the University of Oregon.
Besides, the wrestling arc might not end with her.
“Hopefully my future kids, they’re going to become little wrestlers at 3 years old,” she said with a laugh, “and everyone else can curse them.”
That said, Ples is proof it’s never too late to try.
