Will Rogers High School Wrestling Program Remembers Teen

The head wrestling coach at Will Rogers High School says his team is devastated after one of his wrestlers died of carbon monoxide poisoning.

Officers say Kadence Brown and a friend died in a car that was idling outside of a Dunkin Donuts in Tulsa.

Police say the car had an exhaust leak.

Brown’s nickname was KK, and she was on the wrestling team at Will Rogers High School all four years.

Derrick Gates, the Head Wrestling Coach at Will Rogers High School, says she was a hard worker, a leader, and a good friend.

Brown’s friends say she was a girly girl when it came to her appearance, but when she got on the wrestling mat, she was fierce.

"We're planning on putting together a shadow box with one of her singlets, her head gear, her shoes. We're going to hang it up in here,” said Gates. “So we just got to get all that put together now."

Gates has been Brown’s coach for the entirety of her high school wrestling career.

"KK's been with us for 4 years,” said Gates. “She was a team leader. Everyone looked up to her; she led through the practices, kind of made my job easier. I didn't have to spend the whole time just holding their hands, making them do everything. She knew what needed to be done."

Gates says Brown was a great wrestler, a great friend, and a great competitor.

"She was just always having fun, but when it came time to get to work and business needs to be done, she was the first person leading the charge,” said Gates.

Brown’s coach says she cared about everyone, even if they weren’t on her team.

"Wrestling is a combat sport,” said Gates. “You get in each other's face the whole entire time, but after almost every single match, she would go up and she'd hug her opponent. She cared about everyone, she was a great leader, she was just a great person to be around."

He says it’s been tough for him and the kids on the team, but he’s proud of the wrestlers for helping each other get through it.

"We've opened up the wrestling room to all the wrestlers, all the time,” said Gates. “I tell them that this is our safe place, this is our room, you can be in here whenever you need to. If you're having a tough day at school, you're like, 'I just can't, can't be around people right now, people keep saying stuff to me, it's upsetting me,' it's like, just come down here."

Gates says the wrestling team is a family, and there will be a hole in that family without Brown.

"Whenever we do our break-down at the end of practice, we go 'Ropers on three, family on 6,”’ said Gates. “The last thing we always say, and it's been the same thing for the last 4 years, the last thing we say when we leave this room is 'family.' And that's what I try to preach to them. I'm like, hey, we're there for each other. We are each other's family. We may not be blood, but we're the next best thing." 

Gates says what KK would want the team to do is to keep pushing through and winning as much as they can, and they hope to honor her by doing just that.