Steinert has had a wrestling program for many years and this season one of the members got to represent Steinert High School in an extraordinary way. Steinert freshman Ella Johnson made it to the New Jersey State Tournament, being one out of three girls from Mercer County to qualify in this type of competition and winning 8th overall.

Ella Johnson wanted to join the Steinert Wrestling team because she was a wrestler before coming to Steinert and she “wanted to join a team,”. Going into this, she knew there weren’t going to be a lot of girls but that did not stop her. Before getting to Steinert, she had lots of practice, including in her own home. “He [Johnson’s father] was a coach so I did it at my house,”. The training she would go to is “wrestling practice and strength conditioning”. Even through all of her hard work, she had doubted herself at some points saying that she wanted to quit a lot but would go to keep “working hard and went back to practice”.

From all of this, she got into the Varsity team and into the first year of an all girls team. She goes on to say how she enjoyed it and “We had a lot of girls come out this year and I hope more come out next year,”. This year for districts, regions (regionals?), and states, her training partner was Rudy Ortiz. Although she had no other woman to go and prepare with, she was used to it by now since she has “been wrestling like that since I started out,”. 

With all of the training in this program, she went to make it into the New Jersey State Tournament and by doing that, she reflects on how “It is something I always wanted to do,”. Even before she went into wrestling she had her goals set and “It was like a goal fulfilled,”. It went to be more than a fulfilled goal when she went and won 8th place, being 1 out of 3 girls in Mercer County to get this opportunity. 

Through this journey, she wanted to say who her number 1 supporters were, who were her dad and the other coaches and staff. The biggest influence on her was her father, being a volunteer assistant coach and saying that she has watched him coach his team for a while and he has coached her.

Ella goes to look forward to the future of what her wrestling career will take part in. She hopes to be a positive influence to future wrestlers, hoping to make them keep going.