2024 U.S. Olympic Team Trials for Boxing Women get underway tonight at CAJUNDOME
by Luke Santangelo
The women’s brackets begins tonight at the 2024 U.S. Olympic Team Trials for Boxing in Lafayette, La., at the CAJUNDOME.
While only six bouts will take place this evening for the women, they do not lack in exciting matchups.
The night will get underway with the highly anticipated 54 kg weight class, with 2022 Youth World Championships bronze medalist Sa’Rai Brown-El (Marietta, Ga.) making her elite debut against Summer Griffiths (Myrtle Beach, S.C.).
However, the bout of the night may come during the second bout of the evening with Lupe Gutierrez (Fountain, Colo.) and Jasmine Hampton (Ann Arbor, Mich.). All eyes will be on their bout, as each boxer has a victory against each other this year. Gutierrez is the reigning Olympic Trials champion and looks to keep the title in her corner. On the other side of the ring, you have Hampton, a member of USA Boxing’s 2023 High Performance Squad and winner of the 2023 USA Boxing National Qualifier. The winner of this bout will face the brackets number two-seed, Jewry Rodriguez (Humble, Texas), later this week.
The final 54 kg battle of the night will be Lia Lewandowski (Berlin, N.J.) going head-to-head against Chantel Navarro (Glendale, Calif.). The winner of this bout will move on to a semifinal bout against the bracket’s top-seed, Yoseline Perez (Houston, Texas).
In the 60 kg weight class, there will be only two first-round bouts. The first bout tonight will be between Casey Dial (Clarksville, Tenn.) and Alexandra Plichta (Austin, Texas). The winner of this opening matchup will go up against Jessica Capurso (Sayville, N.Y.). The second bout in this weight class will be between Lisa Greer (Colorado Springs, Colo.) and Jessica Lampron (Boston, Mass.). The winning boxer will face Karla Hall (Henderson, Nev.) on Thursday.
Kamrya Ndango (Houston, Texas) and Talia Halvorsen (Harwood Heights, Ill.) will close out the evening in the 75 kg weight class, with whoever comes out victorious advancing to Thursday’s semifinal bout against Jillian Petroglia (Lindenhurst, N.Y.), the reigning National Championships silver medalist and the brackets number two seed.
The additional weight classes and women competing in these Trials will begin on Thursday.
In the 50 kg weight class, Esmeralda Gonzalez (Dallas, Texas) and Noelle Harro (Fayetteville, N.C.) will go head-to-head against each other to highlight their division that evening. Gonzalez was a former junior and youth High Performance team member who recently won the 2023 Summer Festival, cementing her position as the two-seed. Harro is looking for the upset and has been in numerous camps this year with Team USA as a training partner.
Deborah Grant (San Antonio, Texas) and Bianca Ortega (Spring Lake, N.C.) will be the bout to watch in the 57 kg weight class. Grant is the number one seed in the bracket after claiming top honors at this year’s National Qualifier in Detroit and will look to show why she earned the top spot.
Stacia Suttles (Philadelphia, Pa.), an international medalist who competed at the 2020 U.S. Olympic Team Trials, will face off against Ariana Carrasco (Colorado Springs, Colo.). Carrasco defeated the top-rank boxer in this weight class, Stephanie Simon (Miami, Fla.), at a club show a few weeks ago and hopes to pull off a similar upset in the opening round against Suttles.
The competition will begin today at noon for the second day of action from the 2023 USA Boxing National Championships before the female boxers kick off the 6:00 p.m. session. All the boxing action can be followed by clicking here.