By: Amanda Monahan
There’s a 14 year-old girl you do not want to mess with.
She stands at roughly five foot three, 125 pounds with long blonde hair.
But don’t let Kassandra Baylis’ appearance fool you. She’s an amateur boxer who can take on opponents a lot bigger.
“Kassandra is not the kind of girl you want to mess with but we call her the bombshell for a reason because she’s a very very nice, pretty girl. She doesn’t always look like much but believe me you don’t want to go barking up that tree, “ her coach Kevin Flesch said with a laugh.
She may not look like a boxer at first glance but her peers at school knows her power.
“Some people joke around, like the boys they joke around with me about it and then they say ‘oh no you’ll knock me out’,” she said.
In short they’re basically afraid of her.
“Uh, ya,” she said with a laugh.
Baylis won the New York State Amateur Boxing Championship on the weekend of March 9th. The Frankford native went up against a girl who had 10 pounds on her.
“I didn’t know that she weighed more than me, I didn’t know anything about her. Kevin told me right before I went in and fought that she only had two fights and she lost both. Turns out she had five and won all five so I broke her record,” she said.
“The girl had power, she did have 10 pounds on Kassandra but I believe it worked in Kassandra’s advantage because Kassandra had just that much more speed on the girl. So that 10 pounds didn’t really make a big difference,” Flesch said.
Baylis and Flesch had a specific game plan heading into the fight, to rush right on to a two, three, two (right hand, left hook, right hand). After the second eight count her opponent’s coach threw in the towel and she won by a technical knockout.
“The ref said afterwards if they didn’t throw in the towel he would have called the fight,” she said.
“I was so excited, it was the best feeling in the world when they held my hand up,”
Her hard work has paid off, she just started the sport six months ago.
“Kassandra is one of the hardest workers I have in the club, she’s fully committed, fully dedicated. The only time she takes off is either I give her or time just from being ill or from injuries things like that. But for the most part Kassandra is gung-ho, she’s here every single night, works the hardest out of everyone and on her off night she’s in active rest,” Flesch said.
Baylis gets back into the ring this weekend with a match in Messina, New York, to defend her title, and then it’s back to Canada for a match later in the month in Orangeville.