Blue Springs South senior Killian Evans likes to hype herself up before she has a wrestling match.
She likes to sit down, concentrate and give herself “self talks,” which is something she learned from South assistant coach Austin Eads. Those talks were aimed to build her confidence.
“I just say you got to believe in yourself and your training,” Evans said. “I have a saying where I tell myself, ‘I am the fastest, I am the strongest, I have the best technique and I am the best on this mat when I want to be.’ I like to tell myself, ‘I will win this match.’ That’s really big for me.”
Those “self talks” are something that Evans used to help her get through the Junior 100-pound bracket in the U.S. Marines Corps 16U & Junior Nationals last week at the Fargodome in Fargo, N.D. The tournament is considered the biggest high school level freestyle tournament in the country, so it was a big test for Evans.
She fared well and earned her second All-America honor of her career as she took fifth place after defeating Liberty, Missouri’s Sandy Breeden 20-10 in 4 minutes and 44 seconds in her final match of the day. She finished her bracket with a 5-2 record.
“I feel like I could have done better, especially in that match to determine what place I was going for,” said Evans, who finished in seventh place last year. “I should have made some adjustments there. I am striving to do better. I am super proud of myself for where I have gotten.
“This was my third time going to Fargo, so I knew what to expect.”
Evans rolled through her first four matches to make her way to the semifinals bracket as she won by tech fall in all of them including a 12-2 victory in 4:11 against Lola Gonzales of Colorado.
“My shots were working really well,” Evans said. “I felt like I was really strong with (gut wrenches). I don’t know a whole lot of girls who hit guts. So if a girl has a nasty gut, and I feel like I have a pretty good one, it works really well.”
The South senior then fell to eventual champion Jaclyn Bouzakis of Pennsylvania 12-0 to move to the consolation bracket.
“I knew I was wrestling a really good girl,” Evans said of her match with Bouzakis. “I didn’t want to psych myself out, so I approached it like I would any other match. She wrestled at a really fast pace and I was grateful for the opportunity to wrestle someone like her who had a really fast pace and had really good technique.
“It really pushed me to be better. It gave me ideas on how to wrestle better.”
In the consolation semifinals, Evans said she kept getting caught in a headlock, which led to some takedowns for Ohio’s Ella Thomas, who eventually won by fall in 2:05. Evans rebounded by defeating Breeden, who is a two-time Missouri folkstyle state champion.
“I went into it like any other match,” Evans said of her fifth-place bout with Breeden. “I was like ‘Dang, this is the same girl I wrestled in the Platte County district finals a couple of months ago.’ I knew what to expect. We wrestled multiple times. I got to my shots and won by tech.”
Evans said she plans on wrestling in some other freestyle tournaments during the fall, including the Super 32 Challenge in Greensboro, N.C.
As for her senior season with the Jaguars, she is aiming high and will look for her fourth all-state finish. Last season, she took third in the Class 2 105-pound weight class at the Missouri State High School Wrestling Championships, which was her third all-state finish of her career.
“I am going for that state championship,” Evans said.
