Kennedy High coach Mike Kim likes to say that wrestling is one of the few sports that doesn’t discriminate against athletic ability. If someone doesn’t have the speed, hand-eye coordination, vertical leap, or size to play certain sports at a high level, they can still find a place in wrestling.
“We just need somebody with heart,” Kim says.
Miyuki Pugrad and Diana Mendoza both have natural athleticism, but when they drifted into the wrestling ring, it was their desire, their heart and their drive that helped them rise to high ranks in the sport.
The two seniors were part of the Fighting Irish team that won the Empire League championship this year, then they both qualified for the State Championships and are now preparing for the National Championships in Oklahoma in March.
Not bad for a couple of girls who didn’t even know wrestling was a female sport when the entered high school.
Miyuki joined the team as a freshman on the suggestion of a friend. After competing in cross country in the fall, she heard about the wrestling team and decided to check it out.
“I just kind of hopped into it,” Pugrad said.
Pugrad nearly didn’t wrestle her senior year and Mendoza has wrestled only two of her four years in high school.
Still, after making the trip to nationals, Kim expects both will have offers to wrestle at the collegiate level.
He said it’s a growing sport that is looking for athletes with potential.
Sitting outside a La Palma Jiu Jitsu studio, where they are training with Kim and other members of the Kennedy team, Pugrad and Mendoza are almost amused by their journeys so far. Their personalities also appear drastically different. Pugrad is talkative and animated, while Mendoza says fewer words.
Yet, both have bright smiles and laugh easily.
After getting involved with the team as a freshman, Pugrad took an instant liking to the sport.
She admits to always having an aggressive side that helped her, but she also picked up the mechanics and the techniques fairly quickly.
Still, Mendoza said she sees mostly an internal desire that has made her teammate successful.
“I’d say it’s her drive,” Mendoza said of Pugrad.
Pugrad missed much of this season, despite great success in her first three years.
She said she wasn’t sure she could commit this year, so she did not join the team at the start of the season.
But when she attended a match to cheer on her friends, she realized how much she missed it.
“I was like, ‘oh my god,’ I belong here,” Pugrad said.
She worked hard to get back into shape, and wound up taking first at the CIF-SS Championships, first at the Master’s and 2nd at the State Championships in the 131 pound division.
Kim said that Pugrad is the kind of athlete that never needs to be pushed, only given guidance. And he said that also translates to her class work as well.
“Everything she does, she wants to be successful,” Kim said of Pugrad.
Mendoza wrestled as a sophomore, when she qualified for the Masters in her first year.
After skipping her junior year she returned this year, to take 2nd at the CIF-SS Championships, 8th at the Masters and finish in the top 12 at State, in the 143 pound division.
Mendoza admits that she might not have the same technical skill as many of her competitors, but she makes up for it with strength and stamina. Although, she said the techniques of the sport tend to fascinate her.
She laughs that even when an opponent takes her down, she sometimes marvels at the how the technique worked. But admiring an opponent’s skill doesn’t mean accepting defeat.
“She doesn’t like to lose,” Kim said of Mendoza.
In fact, Pugrad said that there have been lots of times when Mendoza would beat an opponent who seemed to be the more sound wrestler.
Her theory is that Mendoza’s strength, aggressiveness and a kind of awkward movements, throw opponents off balance.
“She kept winning and no one on our team knew how she was winning,” Pugrad said. “But she had a really hard work ethic.”
Part of her drive, did come from a simple desire to be a little tougher, Mendoza admits.
“I wanted to learn how to fight, like in the Hunger Games,” she said with a sheepish smile.
Kennedy High started a girls wrestling team five years ago. This year, there were enough teams among the league schools hold an Empire League Championship, which Kennedy won.
The growth of the sport is providing opportunities for girls, though as it grows, those opportunities will become harder to come by.
But Kim is hopeful that the girls who follow in the footsteps of Pugrad and Mendoza will still find those opportunities. All they need is heart.
