PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Matt Azevedo has been the head wrestling coach at Drexel University since 2011, and has led the Dragons into the national rankings multiple times. Prior to coaching, he was an elite wrestler in his own right.
Azevedo grew up in Las Vegas. As a child, he said his first sports focus was not wrestling.
"I was out in the front yard playing baseball every chance I had and I did that all the way through high school," he said.
"But in junior high, there were signups for wrestling. Wrestling was in my family, my Uncle John was an NCAA National Champion and an Olympian in 1980. So I knew a little bit about wrestling and I just thought, 'I'm going to try this.' And I guess the rest is history."
That history included winning a state championship in high school. Azevedo talked about whether he fully appreciated what he accomplished at such a young age.
"In the moment, I was just being competitive, which ... came naturally to me. I was always super, super competitive and was competing at everything. But I think after it happened, yeah, it was kind of like, 'Whoa, I just won state,'" he recalled.
"I wasn't even varsity in the beginning of the year. My freshman year, I got beat out, I wasn't varsity. As the year went on, I got better and just got my way into the lineup and then I found myself winning a state championship. I think that's when I started to realize, okay, maybe this is my pathway, this is what I was meant to do."
Azevedo went on to become a star wrestler in college at Arizona State and then Iowa State, competed as a member of the U.S. National Team and won the 2008 U.S. Open National Championship.
You can listen to the entire interview with Matt Azevedo by checking out the latest episode, above, of the KYW Newsradio original podcast, "1-on-1 with Matt Leon." For more, subscribe on the Audacy app or wherever you get your podcasts.
Follow Matt Leon on Twitter @MattLeon1060.
