State champ Jade Hardee makes sure to ‘give it my all’

1st from Tinley Park to win Illinois Kids Wrestling Federation girls state title

Tinley Park Bulldogs boys youth wrestling coach Mickey Griffin is stepping down after 15 years of helping produce some of the top wrestlers in the area and state.

He never imagined that his final state champion would be a girl.

Eighth grader Jade Hardee is such a special wrestler that in January he had her working out with the Bulldogs boys team and joined Bulldogs girls coach Jamie Ruggio Hubbard in overseeing Hardee’s development.

Hardee became the first person from Tinley Park to win an Illinois Kids Wrestling Federation girls state championship when she won the 93-pound division March 9 at the BMO Center in Rockford, needing just 42 seconds to pin her opponent in the title match.

It was a big accomplishment, but Hardee was not jumping around and going crazy after the referee’s hand smacked the mat.

“I was pretty cool about it, I didn’t do any of that stuff,” Hardee said. “I’m the type where if I could have done a little better in a match, I’m a little bit harder on myself. But then the next time I know to give it my all.”

Griffin, a former wrestler at Purdue, never envisioned 15 years ago that this is how his career was going to end. The sport was dominated by males with a few females here and there popping up into the scene and getting scorned for it.

Now, it has grown to the point where the Illinois High School Association has recognized girls wrestling for three years.

“It’s exciting for the sport,” Griffin said. “It’s great because it provides girls a brand new opportunity that wasn’t really there before.

“Why can’t a girl be involved in a physical sport? Why can’t a girl participate in something that will help her defend herself ? Why was that always so taboo?”

He said allowing girls to wrestle was something that was long overdue.

Hardee wholeheartedly agrees and she is trying to get some of her friends involved.

“I like seeing how a boy-dominant sport is going to girls,” she said. “I feel like when people think of wrestling, they think of boys and now they are going to start to

TRAVIS HARDEE Jade Hardee, an eighth grader from Tinley Park, is declared the winner of a match during the Illinois Kids Wrestling Federation girls state championship. Hardee brought home a state title from the tournament.