BENNINGTON, Neb. (KMTV) — Maycee Peacher’s passion for wrestling is no secret but for her it’s more than just her love of competition.
Yeah, the Bennington senior is aiming to become the first girl in Nebraska to win four state titles, but that comes second to her work to help more girls get on the mat.
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Maycee Peacher loves wrestling.
“I have two older brothers and they both wrestled,” she said.
In fact she’ll talk all day about it.
“I would always try to wrestle the boys there on the mats and stuff,” Peacher explained. “And my parents were like ‘no you’re not allowed to blah blah blah.’”
She got started at age seven.
“I was doing a cartwheel off the couch and I broke my arm,” she said (this happened when she was six).
That’s when (her parents) relented.
“They said that I could wrestle the next year,” Peacher said. “I started wrestling and it’s just been… history since I guess.”
She tumbled right into coach Alan Pokorny's wrestling room.
“She was with our middle school program and she was beating boys at that time,” Pokorny said. “And once they sanctioned the sport, she’d do well with the girls.”
Maycee learned what matters most is how hard you work.
“My other brother, Braxton, I’ve basically wrestled with him my whole life,” she said. “This is the first year I’ve not wrestled with him.
“He’s always been the hardest worker so he always tries to motivate me to be the hardest worker in the room.”
Her first state tournament: she won.
Same with all of them since.
Her success: inspiring others.
“That following Monday (after her first state title) we had six girls show up at our club that wanted to start wrestling and now some of those are in high school, so that was pretty cool,” Pokorny said.
“For me it’s the younger girls looking up to me, the girls that are wanting to join wrestling but are hesitant knowing that it really is a fun sport,” Peacher said. “And yes, sometimes practice does suck, but it really does work out in the end.”
In her final season on a high school mat she hopes wrestlers will talk about her hard work.
“I can’t do it for others, nobody can do it for me,” Peacher said. “If I really want to get this fourth I really have to show that I want it. It’s not gonna get handed to me.”
Maycee is committed to wrestle at McKendree University where she plans to major in elementary and special education.
The girls’ state wrestling tournament is Feb. 18-19 at the CHI Health Center.
