Wisconsin Friends Box to Learn Tough Lesson – by Bill Harris

When friends fight someone always comes in second. And second in a boxing match means a loss. This was the case at the USA – Wisconsin Amateur Boxing Championship preliminaries Friday, Jan. 11, 2002, at the United Community Center, 1028 S. Ninth Street, Milwaukee, when Alicia Walcher, 14, 109, 0-0, of Peshtigo Boxing Club, faced her friend and teammate 14-year-old Crystal Willis, 108, 1-2, also of the Peshtigo club. Give Walcher a big hand, though: She had been boxing just one week but wanted to take the bout so badly that her coach Willy Price agreed to let her box against the more practiced Willis for the ring experience.

Earlier, the home team took the opening women’s match of the evening when Jessica Zigman,128, (who I have at 2-2) of the United Community Center Boxing Club, Milwaukee, gave Sienna Bahlman, 18, 130, 0-3, of Wisconsin Rapids Boxing Club, a boxing lesson that resulted in the referee, Angel Villareal, stopping the bout in just under a minute of the second round.

The 14-year-old’s match-up was an experience for sure and not one to the liking of the plucky newcomer, Walcher, who got interested in boxing through friends whom also train under Price at the northeastern Wisconsin club. After absorbing punishment for a round and with few tools to respond the beginner indicated she’d had enough and retired in tears. Her opponent tried to console her but to little avail. Walcher had endured her first boxing match and her first defeat. The combination devastated her even some time later as she sat in the stands with her Peshtigo club friends around her attempting to console the neophyte.

Earlier, a spirited women’s bout brought cheers and applause for the local Zigman and her opponent Bahlman. The losing Bahlman had demonstrated improved skills over this writer’s last view of her but she still lacked the guns to stand up to the quicker and more skilled Zigman.

Bahlman took repeated shots that snapped her head back. In the first round the ref counted a standing eight for Bahlman as Zigman looked on appreciating her work against the teenage blond from Ken Hilgers Wisconsin Rapids Boxing Club.

Bahlman continues to look almost as awkward as she did on her first outing in Oshkosh last December but there are some small signs of improvement. When she learns to keep her hands up to protect herself, especially the right, she will advance greatly as a boxer.

None can fault her heart, though, as she went toe to toe with the more skillful Zigman on several occasions in the first round.

At the break she was visibly in trouble but gamely went out to meet her adversary only to run into several solid head shots that brought another eight count. Zigman took things seriously after that early second skirmishes and smashed Bahlman hard to gain a third standing eight count that spelled the end of the bout.

The blond Bahlman found it within herself to smile at her opponent whose long black hair was loosed from her headgear after the bout making an interesting contrast as the two boxers talked in the ring after their match. The sportsmanship exhibited by amateur women boxers always seems to be a genuine and enthusiastic display.

Congratulations must go to Peshtigo’s Price for instilling a fervor in his boxers that drives them to want to compete. Willis, a little more than a month earlier, had faced in Oshkosh, Wisc., a far more experienced boxer in Faizah Ami, 106, who had about five bouts behind her. The two boxed what was billed as a “workout”.

USA Boxing amateur rules forbid “exhibitions” but Willis wanted to box so badly that officials running the show bent the rules a little to allow both boxers a chance to get the experience of competing before a crowd under actual competition rules. In that contest the referee brought the doctor in to check Willis in the second round after she had absorbed stiff punishment.

The doctor advised that the contest be ended because of her gushing nosebleed. But Willis was pleased with the outing, which won’t go onto her record because of the nature of the contest. Sixteen-ounce gloves were substituted for the 10-ounce competition gloves both boxers wore into the ring.

As the Peshtigo team was leaving the UnitedCommunity Center Saturday night, both losing and winning girls said they’d be ready to box next month in Oshkosh when an amateur show is planned for the Eagles Club ring, Saturday, Feb. 2.

There were 14 bouts on Friday, two of them the women’s contests mentioned above. A standing-room-only crowd of around 400 made the night a memorable one. The next tier of bouts — regionals — will be held in February in Iowa.