NAMPA — The list is exclusive.
Moscow’s Skyla Zimmerman. Coeur d’Alene’s Alyssa Randles. Caldwell’s Marissa Jimenez. And now, Blackfoot’s Keanna Conrad.
The junior joined rare company Jan. 3, becoming just the fourth girl ever to win three consecutive Rollie Lane Invitational championships with a pin over Jerome’s Olivia Bezdicek at the Ford Idaho Center.
“I love the sport of wrestling, so I kind of look up to them because they made history first,” Conrad said.
But it wasn’t easy. The two wrestled to a scoreless first period before a blood timeout in the second opened the door for Conrad.
Conrad and Blackfoot girls head coach Stephen Adams used the opportunity to regroup.
“Just being able to coach somebody where it almost feels like you’re running an Xbox controller — the faith she has in me and the trust she has in me, and me knowing how she wrestles to be able to vocalize that to her and her to make that adjustment and make an immediate difference,” Adams said. “As a coach, it’s most likely once in a lifetime.”
The adjustment worked. Bezdicek was called for stalling in the match after repeatedly running Conrad out of bounds with a two-on-one without attempting to finish. But that was the last time the fellow two-time state and national champion escaped Conrad’s grasp. She hit a reversal in the second period before taking control of the match for good in the third.
“I kind of did a duck under and I pulled her down, then I ended up on top, and then I did a barbed wire,” Conrad said. “I waited for the ref to count before I fully pinned her.”
The victory was especially impressive considering Conrad and Bezdicek’s history. They faced each other in last year’s final with Conrad pinning her in the second round. The two also met in the first match of this season, with Conrad winning 4-0 in a dual at Bonneville on Dec. 4.
Conrad pinned all but one opponent at the tournament, with the exception being a 10-0 major decision over Forest Grove, Oregon’s Renae Cook in the semifinals.
“Watching her win for the third time was a blast,” Adams said. “I’ve never seen her wrestle better than this weekend, and I’ve been coaching her since she was basically a sixth grader.”
The performance came fresh off Conrad’s first high school loss — a 9-3 defeat to Texas’ Kailin Sebert in the Reno Tournament of Champions semifinals on Dec. 22, snapping a 96-match win streak.
Conrad, who was seeded fourth at Reno while Sebert was the top seed, came back through the consolation bracket to place third at the tournament.
“I knew she was gonna be good, and that’s what I went to Reno for, was to find better matches,” Conrad said. “Because here I was just winning and I wasn’t really learning anything. I would go back to practice and do the same thing.”
But Conrad didn’t dwell on the defeat for long.
“I was kind of bummed, but it kind of felt good to finally meet my competition,” Conrad said. “Finally, I had something to work on.”
Conrad is now 108-1 in her storied high school career after winning the Jaybird Invitational at Columbia High School in Nampa. She has yet to lose to an opponent in or from Idaho. The two-time reigning state champion will look to capture her third consecutive state title later this season.
“I don’t feel any kind of pressure, because I enjoy wrestling,” Conrad said. “Win or loss, at least it’s fun doing it.”






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