COLUMBUS — The third and final day of the OHSAA state girls wrestling tournament began with Washington sophomore Leah Marine and junior Lyndyn Gibbs competing in the Consolation Semifinals, with both guaranteed to finish as high as third and no worse than sixth.

Marine was first to wrestle, and she took on freshman Ashlynn Brokaw of Mount Vernon. Marine would ultimately lose a 6-0 decision which sent her to the fifth place match.

Gibbs wrestled minutes later against junior Emily Flynn of Hubbard. Gibbs was able to secure a first period pin to advance to the third place match for the second year in a row.

In the fifth place match, Marine would lose a 4-2 decision in overtime to freshman Maycee Adams (38-8) of Eaton. This put Marine at sixth place on the podium at 105 pounds.

“It’s definitely an improvement from last year,” said Marine. “I’m really grateful for the experience, but the work is not done. I’m looking to get on some teams in the off season. My brother and I are going to some open tournaments and we are just going to keep practicing.”

“Leah had an incredible season,” said head coach Wes Gibbs. “She ended the season with 38 wins and 14 losses. That’s 52 matches, which is a long season. She worked hard every day. A lot of people that don’t understand wrestling, they don’t understand the time and effort that these athletes put in. The practice partners (Leah and Lyndyn) got to the State tournament and placed here. That’s huge when you have two girls that you can count on to win those big matches. They won a lot of them this year. Leah’s coming back, this is her third or fourth year wrestling. She will be back with a vengeance, I can assure you of that. It won’t be a sixth place finish next year, I think she can be at the top of the podium. It is wide open now with Chloe Dearwester (four-time State Champion from Harrison) graduating.”

In the third place match, Gibbs had a rematch against junior Abigail Mozden (52-6) of Alliance. Gibbs pinned Mozden in the quarterfinals on Saturday. This time around, Mozden would win a 7-4 decision to claim third place, putting Gibbs at fourth place on the podium.

Gibbs spoke about her plan for the off season.

“Definitely getting more offensive. I feel like when it comes to big matches, I tend to go back to old habits where I am just defensive and waiting for them to do something and make a mistake. I want to take more risks, because I feel like if you don’t take risks, then you can’t score, and without scoring, you can’t win. I’m definitely going to do a lot of freestyle wrestling too. I love freestyle and I feel like it has helped me a lot just in neutral.”

Gibbs will travel to West Virginia and Tulsa, Oklahoma later this year for off season wrestling tournaments.

“That’s a heck of a season,” said Coach Gibbs. “She had 48 wins and three losses, two of those losses came this weekend. All three came in the last two weeks. She had a heck of a run. This is tough, it’s a tough tournament. We expected some setbacks but not a lot of setbacks. She will be back. It’s wide open, she is one of the top girls in the state and she is going to get there.”

Coach Gibbs talked about Lady Lion wrestling moving forward.

“We are going to try and go with earlier practice times for next season. A lot of girls in Washington Court House have to work in the evenings, so I think it is a deterrent to practice later in the evening. It’s taking away from their evening time as well for those that don’t work, and kids like to have their free time. Hopefully the girls on our team can talk to their friends and classmates and continue to get more girls to come out. It’s a tough sport, but I feel like if people would encourage their daughters to wrestle, their daughters would be a whole lot more confident and be able to handle themselves in tough situations.”