AHS Wrestling

Come out to support the best Booster Club!

This Saturday…we hope to see you there!

😋 Don’t miss out on some great food and supporting your favorite wrestling team!
Good at all Jethro's BBQ locations. Dine in or carry out.

We are excited to announce our partnership with Jethro's BBQ! Next time you hit up the best BBQ place in Iowa, show the image below to your server and Ames High Wrestling will receive a donation of 15% of your bill! If you can’t find the image below, just tell them you’re with Ames High Wrestling. This is a great deal and will benefit our team immensely.

*good at all Jethros locations from 8/12-11/30.

End of the summer team building meal.
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We can’t thank the Ames High Athletics Booster Club enough for their support. New singlets, warmups and bags have the girls wrestling team ready to roll into the 24-25 season!

Always part of the family! Thank you for everything.

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Ames Community School District

Congratulations to the newest members of the National Honor Society, Sarah, Lily, Brooklyn and Miranda for holding themselves to high expectations on and off the mat.
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Ames Community School District

Just passing along some information we were asked to share.

Today, the Ames Community School District released its Notice of Public Hearing – Proposed Property Tax Levy FY2025. The public hearing will be held on April 1, 2024, at 5:30 pm. View the full notice: https://amescsd.org/departments/business-services/financial-reports/

So grateful for all the opportunities wrestling provides for EVERYONE!

High School Girls Wrestling | Iowa LIfe Tatum Shepherd, Lilly Luft and Naomi Simon are pioneers in the world of girls wrestling in Iowa. Since the sport was sanctioned by the IGHSAU in 2022, the pa...

The best in the business!
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Congrats, Jabari Hinson on your podium finish at 2024 USAW Folkstyle Nationals Junior.

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Ames High School

Congratulations Iowa State Wrestling and AHS Wrestling Alumni Manager Emily Matulac on winning the Big 12 Championship!

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Ames Community School District

😉 x 5

Just heard today that 2000 Iowa HS State Wrestling Champion at 3A 140, Brandon Winkey currently has 4 kids involved with wrestling right now and all 4 are doing a good job with it! His daughter, Alexis Winkey placed 6th at the 2024 Iowa HS Girls State Wrestling Tournament at 125 lbs! Brandon’s sons, Jackson Winkey and Braxton Winkey both qualified for the 2024 Iowa HS State Wrestling Tournament. Their brother, Bennie Winkey also wrestled for Ames this year!

I wrestled Brandon Winkey of Ames HS in the semifinals at Junior Freestyle state my junior year in 2000. He killed me. Like, he took me down and gutted me and teched me like it was nothing. I was generally stronger than most guys I wrestled, but this dude was something else. I couldn’t move him to save my life!

Iowa HS Girls State Wrestling 125
1st Place - Molly Allen of Riverside, Oakland
2nd Place - Destiny Brown of Ridge View
3rd Place - Hannah Rogers of Bettendorf
4th Place - Calista Rodish of Raccoon River-Northwest
5th Place - Jillian Worthen of Union, LaPorte City
6th Place - Alexis Winkey of Ames
7th Place - Lilly Stough of Waverly-Shell Rock
8th Place - Kaydn Meyer of South Winneshiek

BRANDON WINKEY; AMES HS ‘00

1999 3A 135
1. David Brown, Sr., LeMars
2. Pat Rial, Sr., Fort Dodge
3. Justin Scott, Sr., Oskaloosa
4. Johnny Galloway Jr., Fr., Waterloo East
5. Brandon Winkey, Jr., Ames
6. Jim Kennedy, Sr., Dubuque Senior

2000 3A 140
1. Brandon Winkey, Sr., Ames
2. David Weihs, Jr., Harlan
3. Anthony Bribriesco, Bettendorf
4. John Gabrielson, Sr., Iowa City High
5. Mike Winklepleck, Jr., Sioux City Heelan
6. Matt Vasey, Jr., Des Moines Lincoln

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Take a listen to Coach Steffen talk about the AHS Girls Wrestling team and why it’s a great program to be part of.

Check it out! A new episode of our Amazing Education Podcast is currently available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or where you enjoy listening. You won't want to miss this episode where we were joined by Matt Steffen, Ames High head girls' wrestling coach. We had an amazing conversation about what it’s like to coach girls' wrestling, the increase in participation at Ames High, and advice he would give to future athletes. https://spoti.fi/3ReuUV0

Congrats, Allison! Crushing it on and off the mat.

Congratulations to two of our Middle School hammers, Jaimon Mogard (2nd) and Jaya Theilen (3rd) on their podium finishes at State. The future is bright!

🔨Jabari Hinson
OG 🔨 Dwight Hinson

I want to give a shout-out to Jabari Hinson out of Ames HS in Iowa! Jabari, the returning 3A 126 runner-up, is a Junior in HS this year and made the Iowa HS State Wrestling podium for the 2nd time, placing 4th at 3A 138. He has now gone 2-4 as a Sophomore and Junior at the Iowa HS state tournament… And I have to be honest… As great of a showing as I personally feel 4th place at state is, I feel Jabari epitomizes someone in which his placing at this year’s state tournament doesn’t tell the whole story. He was in an exceptionally stacked weight class this year. To give you a frame of reference, he was in a bracket with a 3X state champion who was going for 4 (Carter Freeman of Waukee) as well as the guy who actually beat Freeman in the state finals (Koy Davidson of Fort Dodge). Not to mention, an emerging Sophomore talent named Cody Trevino was in his bracket as well, and it was Trevino, not Freeman or Davidson that beat Jabari on the winner’s side AND for 3rd and 4th at the tournament. And of course I am leaving out several guys who are also very worthy opponents. You get the point, tho. The state tournament is a very important HS tournament, there’s no way around that… but when you really think about it, it is just one tournament and shouldn’t define or paint the picture of a person’s entire season or who they are as a wrestler. With that said, Jabari Hinson had a phenomenal season at state and leading to it. He actually had an OT win over the state champion, Koy Davidson during the regular season at the IAC Invite. Davidson beat Jabari 1-2 times as well, but a win over an incredible talent like Koy is a big deal in any context. He beat many state qualifiers over course of the season. Too many to track. He beat several placers such as; Zane Behrends of Waverly Shell-Rock, Kael Kurtz of IC High, Landon Price of Lake Mills, Nolan Howell of Clear Creek Amana, Kaden Markley (3rd in Kansas), etc. His win over Kurtz was a big one, for it occurred in the consolation semis at the state tournament and it was redemption from a regular season loss he suffered to Kurtz. So according to the results of his matches with him, progress was made!

And he had the season he did all while simultaneously fighting a shoulder injury!

2024 3A-138
1st Place - Koy Davidson of Fort Dodge
2nd Place - Carter Freeman of Waukee Northwest
3rd Place - Cody Trevino of Bettendorf
4th Place - Jabari Hinson of Ames
5th Place - Kael Kurtz of Iowa City, City High
6th Place - Wil Oberbroeckling of Southeast Polk
7th Place - Nolan Howell of Clear Creek-Amana
8th Place - Zane Behrends of Waverly-Shell Rock

Jabari is 91-11 in his last two years of HS wrestling and has been consistently battle-tested throughout both of those seasons. As mentioned, Jabari has placed 2-4 at the state tournament in HS so far and prior to HS, he placed 4-3-7-3 at AAU State from grades 5-8.

Jabari Hinson is the son of Dwight Hinson… Dwight was a four-time NCAA D1 All-American for the Iowa State Cyclones in his day, finishing third as a freshman, second as a sophomore, fourth as a junior and third as a senior! He was also a three-time Big Eight Conference champion and a Big 12 Conference champion. He was ISU’s Male Athlete of the Year in 1998, to boot and was a USA Senior Level All-American and two-time world team qualifier! Prior to Iowa State, Dwight was a two-time state Oklahoma HS State champion for Lawton Eisenhower High School. He finished HS with a 217-20 record. He was also a 3X Junior Freestyle All-American and Junior Freestyle Nationals champion. He was also an All-American at the senior level and was a two-time world team qualifier.

Something else that impresses me about Dwight Hinson is that out of all of the many former D1 wrestling stars who consistently visit this page, there is nobody nicer or more universally supportive of everyone in wrestling than Dwight Hinson. Hinson is a Cyclones legend and I assume ISU still means a lot to him considering he lives in Ames… However, he doesn’t let this strong affiliation influence him in terms of the love and support he consistently shows to everyone from any and every school/college that I write articles about. Dwight Hinson regularly shows love via “liking” posts and in the comments section and he does so for all current and former ISU Cyclones, for sure, but he also will vocally give credit to guys I write about from literally any other college. He’s even shown respect to Hawkeye wrestlers. It is clear that although Cyclone wrestling is where his heart presumably will always be, that he is just generally supportive and respectful for all things wrestling and the warriors who partake in it and IMO, guys like Dwight are GREAT for this sport that we all want to continue to watch grow.

I hope Jabari wins his title next year as a Senior in HS. He’s certainly very capable of it! Easy people to root for! Met him at Night Of Conflict last year… great kid!

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Awards Ceremony
Monday, February 26
7:00 pm
AHS Auditorium

Boys State day 4

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Proud of you, J!

4⃣𝐭𝐡 🏅

Jabari Hinson finishes up his junior season with a fourth-place finish in a stacked 138 IHSAA Championships weight class. Hinson will enter his final prep season with an overall record of 119-17 in varsity competition.

Congratulations, Pnut!

𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗧𝗘 𝗖𝗛𝗔𝗠𝗣𝗜𝗢𝗡 🥇🥜

Daniel Herrera controlled the finals match wire-to-wire, earning the 2024 IHSAA 285 state title. Herrera won by an 18-6 major decision over Waverly-Shell Rock's Caden Wetherell.

It's the first IHSAA wrestling champion for the Little Cyclones since Marcus Coleman completed a three-peat in 2017.

Proud of you, Muscles!

𝑰𝑯𝑺𝑨𝑨 𝑆𝑡𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝐶ℎ𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑠ℎ𝑖𝑝𝑠
1⃣9⃣0⃣ Title Match

Danarii Mickel will take home a silver medal after falling 6-5 in the 190 title match. A late Southeast Polk takedown on the edge was the difference after Mickel leveled the score with 17 seconds remaining.

Boys State day 3

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Big shout-out to “Muscles” aka Denarii Mickel of Ames HS for punching in his 2nd consecutive trip to the Iowa HS State Wrestling Finals at 3A-190!

Champ. Round 1 - Danarii Mickel (Ames) 46-2 received a bye () (Bye)

Champ. Round 2 - Danarii Mickel (Ames) 46-2 won by fall over Jace Tippet (North Scott) 42-11 (Fall 1:53)

Quarterfinal - Danarii Mickel (Ames) 46-2 won by decision over Isaac Thacher (Fort Madison) 23-6 (Dec 2-1)

Semifinal - Danarii Mickel (Ames) 46-2 won by decision over Brayden Koester (Bettendorf) 43-5 (Dec 2-1)

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🥜

Shout-out to Daniel Herrera (Ames) for making the finals at the Iowa HS State Wrestling Tournament at 3A-285!

You guys… I have watched a lot of Iowa HS wrestling in my day… and this guy is up with the all time great heavy guys who has ever competed in this state! You just don’t see big guys like him who are willing to scrap and successfully take shots like a lightweight the way this kid does! He is a transfer from California… great football player!

Champ. Round 1 - Daniel Herrera (Ames) 17-0 received a bye () (Bye)

Champ. Round 2 - Daniel Herrera (Ames) 17-0 won by fall over Aiden Lee (Bettendorf) 21-17 (Fall 2:55)

Quarterfinal - Daniel Herrera (Ames) 17-0 won by fall over Jamal Neeway (Waukee Northwest) 31-7 (Fall 1:30)

Semifinal - Daniel Herrera (Ames) 17-0 won by major decision over Cooper Martinson (Southeast Polk) 34-4 (MD 15-5)

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Congrats, Jackson!

Ella Henningsen, Jackson Winkey voted the Ames Tribune's Athletes of the Week Gilbert girls basketball player Ella Henningsen and Ames boys wrestler Jackson Winkey win Ames Tribune Athlete of the Week honors.

Boys State Day 2

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Boys state day 1
Braxton Winkey 1-1
Jabari Hinson 1-0
Cole Martin 1-1
Jackson Winkey 1-0
Danarii Mickel 1-0
Daniel Herrera 1-0

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Ames High School
Ames Community School District

Starting off with a 💥!

Boys district tournament.

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