LANCASTER, N.Y. — Trista Blasz, 12, a female student, will get to wrestle with the Lancaster Junior Varsity Wrestling Team.
She has participated in countless tournaments, competing and winning against girls and boys. However, when it came time for the seventh-grader to join the junior varsity team in the Lancaster School District, the school physician denied her request.
Trista's mom Danielle Blasz said the doctor made his reasoning clear in a note from his office.
She explained, "It said, 'girls do not play boys sports in Lancaster.'"
In a special meeting on Saturday morning the Lancaster School Board unanimously voted to terminate the doctor that kept Trista from wrestling.
A new panel reviewed Trista's case and Tuesday she got the news she had been fighting for.
Trista told 2 On Your Side, "Being on the team finally and pursuing my dreams."
"It's been a long four months," Danielle Blasz said. "Now that I look at it, it's helped female wrestlers. It has opened new doors."
For the Blasz family, their personal experience has in some ways turned into a nation-wide conversation about girls and sports.
"Trista proved them wrong," Danielle Blasz said. "They can go out and do anything they want to do."
Trista added, "If they say no, just keep fighting and just prove that you can and show them that wrestlings just not for boys. It's for girls too."
Michael J. Valley, PhD, Superintendent of Lancaster Central Schools said in a released statement, "We're glad that the review committee reached a positive outcome and that this student-athlete will be practicing with the team today."