Lumpkin County wrestler in line to make history at state championships

The path for one of the most successful female high school wrestlers in Georgia began with an innocuous announcement in a cheap paper flyer, the kind people often pick up by impulse and discard months later.

Greta Garbuzovas was 7 and her mom, Trish, saw the pamphlet from the local recreation department. She wanted to get Greta and her twin sister, Nora, involved in sports, so she handed the information to the girls so they could have a look.

That’s where it started.

“On this stupid little pamphlet there was a little picture in the corner of a little wrestling thing,” Greta Garbuzovas recalled. “And I was like, ‘I want to do that.’ Not the cool pictures of volleyball or the cool pictures of swimming. It was the wrestling one. So that’s what I settled with, that’s what I went with and I’ve never stopped wrestling.”

She wasn’t bothered by being the only girl in the wrestling room that first year. She got used to it in a hurry and grew accustomed to practicing and competing against the boys. Before long, it was the boys who grew uncomfortable because they were losing to a girl.

“I didn’t feel out of place,” she said. “I felt like I belonged, and I think it really made me the person I am today.”

This weekend, when the GHSA holds its girls wrestling championships at the new Clayton County Convocation Center in Morrow, Greta Garbuzovas — now a senior at Lumpkin County High School in Dahlonega — has a chance to become a four-time state champion.

She has lost only one match in her career — that being a 3-2 decision her sophomore year shortly after having screws inserted in her injured foot.

This year she is 36-0 and has not allowed a point all year.

A fourth state championship would make her a pioneer for the sport.

“Starting wrestling at such a young age, I feel like it’s inspired a lot of other girls to join the sport — girls at my school, girls from other counties, family members,” she said. “I have a little cousin who is trying to wrestling and it’s really cool.”

Sister Nora is an accomplished wrestler, too. She placed third in the state as a freshman and sophomore and won the gold medal a year ago. The two sisters, who used to tussle and scrap when they were kids, are the best of friends today.

Greta Garbuzovas still can recall how nervous she was during that first state championship match in 2023. She was matched against Kendra Heroch of Chattooga, who she had already beaten twice, but was caught in a headlock midmatch and spent a lot of time with her back on the mat.

That’s where the legend began.

Garbuzovas said, “I’m sitting there and I’m literally getting choked out, and I made the realization that, ‘No, I want to win a state championship. This is what I dedicated myself to for all these months.’ And it was one big push and I flipped over.”

She was able to make up the points in the final minutes and escaped with a one-point victory.

“I ended up getting my hand raised, and that moment was unbelievable,” Garbuzovas said.

She got her hand raised a lot.

Garbuzovas repeated as champion in 2024 — again beating Heroch in the final — and picked up her third title last year by defeating Kiera Gilkes of Banks County.

“She’s just pound-for-pound one of the strongest girls in our school,” Lumpkin County coach Scott DeGraff said. “We have an excellent weight training program here, and our kids are getting bigger and stronger. She’s a product of that.”

This week she will be the favorite again in the 140-pound division.

“This has been a goal since I was in the eighth grade,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to prove myself. When I joined the middle school team, I wanted to prove to the boys that I was strong and tough and I could hang around with them. That I wasn’t just some goofy, little girl.