Diné wrestler takes 2nd at state

WINDOW ROCK

A year of hard work paid dividends for Diné high school wrestler Damien Manygoats.

The Phoenix Cortez High athlete capped his senior season by making the finals in the 138-pound weight class at the Arizona Division III state wrestling tournament on Feb. 18.

Manygoats dropped a 4-2 decision to eventual champion Brandon Loyden of American Leadership Academy Gilbert North in the finals.

Prior to this year, he earned two other state qualifications with this being his first-time medaling.

“This is what I expected because I worked hard for this,” Manygoats said. “During the offseason I improved a lot with my takedowns because in my previous years I didn’t really go for takedowns.”

Manygoats said he worked with his dad, Michael, and Cortez wrestling coach Waylon Phillips with his setups for takedowns.

“We just worked on things that I wasn’t really good at,” he said.

For the state tournament, Manygoats was unseeded and to make the finals he beat the fourth and No. 1 seed to get there.

In the opening round, he got past Jayden Anderson of Yuma High School with an 8-2 decision.

“He (Anderson) finished third at sectionals, so I knew my first round was going to be easy,” Manygoats said.

In the next round he ousted fourth seed Armando Herring of Poston Butte with an 8-0 major decision. Herring came into the match as the Division 3, Section 2 champion.

“Coming into that match, I felt pretty confident because I beat him at a previous tournament in Ironwood,” Manygoats said. “I knew his style of wrestling, so I just wrestled him to the best of my abilities to beat him.”

In the semifinals, Manygoats edged top-seed Enzo Morales 4-2 to advance to the state title.

“We saw him wrestled in his previous matches at state,” he said. “During my warmups my coaches were working with me the positions that I might go through to beat him.”

Manygoats scored the first two points with a takedown in the first period and rode his opponent out.

With Morales choosing bottom, the Cortez senior rode him out for the entire second period.

In the third, Manygoats got an escape in the bottom position for a 3-0 lead before Morales took him down for two points.

Manygoats made one final escape, making the final score 4-2.

In the finals, Loyden defeated Manygoats by a 4-2 count. A week before, the two wrestlers met in the sectional tournament with the ALA Gilbert North wrestler winning 6-1.

“It could have gone my way if I wrestled smarter toward the end,” Manygoats said of the state finals. “If I was more aggressive and if I had taken more shots, I would have won the match.”

Manygoats finished the year at 53-4 overall, which is the most wins he’s had in one season since joining the sport four years ago.

“I had no interest in wrestling until the end of my eighth-grade year,” he said. “I had lost interest in basketball, and so I was looking for another sport to do. Since my dad was a wrestler in high school, I wanted to follow his footsteps.”

Manygoats said his parents were elated that he got second with his mom, Cassandra Sampson, citing his two previous outings at state.

“She was very proud, knowing that I didn’t place the previous two years,” he said. “My dad was expecting me to do well with all the hard work I put in during the offseason and wrestling season.”

The Cortez senior also had his younger brother, Anthony, make state as he went 1-2 at 157.

---