In February, he conquered the state on the wrestling mat.<\/p>\n
Now, Kentwood star Ruben Navejas has conquered the nation.<\/p>\n
During the USA Wrestling freestyle and Greco-Roman national tournament held at the Fargodome from July 18-25, nobody in the junior 98-pound weight class was better than Navejas. The Kentwood flyweight, who won the 103-pound state title in February, won six matches on the freestyle circuit, culminating with a 0-2, 1-0, 4-1 win over Maxwell Soria of New York.<\/p>\n
The win is a big achievement, Navejas said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it is bigger than the state tournament because you\u2019re facing multiple state champs from multiple states,\u201d he said. \u201cAt state, I see guys I\u2019m going to wrestle during the season. At nationals, it\u2019s a blind draw.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not just a blind draw, but a draw that essentially consists of the best wrestlers from around the nation. Just to qualify for the tournament, wrestlers must have placed among the top three at state or regionals.<\/p>\n
Navejas won state Greco Roman and freestyle titles in May to earn the berth to the national tournament. Adding to the difficulty level is the fact that he was competing in a 28-man bracket. During the high school state tournament, brackets consist of 16 wrestlers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was definitely more excited about this than state,\u201d said Navejas, who will be a junior in the fall.<\/p>\n
Days before winning the freestyle national title, he earned a silver medal at the junior Greco-Roman national tournament, also held at the Fargodome in North Dakota.<\/p>\n
Unlike the prep circuit, however, different rules apply for the national tournament. Instead of having to beat an opponent during a three-round match, as it is during the high school season, wrestlers at nationals must defeat opponents in two of three rounds. Until dropping one round in his final match against Soria, Navejas had won every round of each one of his previous five matches. He opened the tournament by handling Arizona\u2019s Luiz Lechuga 6-0 in the first round, then pinning him in 47 seconds in the second. Navejas followed with a 7-0, 7-0 win over Christopher Dean of Oregon. He continued the scoreless run in his third match, blanking Kyle Pillars of Michigan 6-0, 6-0 before working over Joey Moita of California 6-0, 6-1. Navejas then thumped Jordan Wigger of South Carolina in the quarterfinals, 6-0, 6-0, then knocked off Kevon Powell of Illinois in the semifinals, 1-0, 4-0.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was expecting to place high this year,\u201d Navejas said.<\/p>\n
Last year, competing as a cadet, Navejas took fifth in the Greco-Roman tournament and third in freestyle.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo me, this is a defining moment in his wrestling career,\u201d said Ruben\u2019s dad, Ruben Navejas sr. \u201cIt\u2019s a very intense tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though the prep season remains several months away, Navejas\u2019 training will continue. During the offseason, he\u2019s in the wrestling room for two hours a day at least twice a week and runs at least three miles each day. Navejas currently weighs 108 pounds and hopes to compete at 103 again in the winter.<\/p>\n
For now, however, he\u2019s going to take a few moments to enjoy the title.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was a really big win for me,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In February, he conquered the state on the wrestling mat. Now, Kentwood star Ruben Navejas has conquered the nation. During the USA Wrestling freestyle and Greco-Roman national tournament held at the Fargodome from July 18-25, nobody in the junior 98-pound weight class was better than Navejas. The Kentwood flyweight, who won the 103-pound state title […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":1494,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-1493","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1493"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1493"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1493\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1493"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=1493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}