After a decade with the Mustangs, co-head coach John Azevedo is hanging up his wrestling shoes at the end of the 2011 season. Yet, with the Pac-10 and NCAA Championships looming, Azevedo remains focused on his wrestlers and what they can accomplish in the next six weeks.
“We’re definitely in the home stretches, so we’re excited about these guys and what they are going to go,” Azevedo said. “I’m looking forward to what God is going to have me do after this because I really don’t know for sure yet.”
With his wealth of experience, Azevedo has no shortage of options once he walks out of Cal Poly’s wrestling room for the final time. Much of his career was spent guiding other wrestlers to championships of their own, but as a collegiate, he picked up four NCAA titles of his own at Cal State Bakersfield.
In 1980, Azevedo accomplished what is impossible now. After winning the Division II title, he was invited to the Division I championships, as was customary. Only, Azevedo did not falter in the face of tougher competition. In fact, he won it all.
He might have gone on to wrestle in Moscow for the Olympic Games that year, having made the Olympic team. But the United States boycotted and he was not able to wrestle for Olympic gold.
When asked if he believed that he truly was a medal contender, Azevedo chuckled and said, “I believe I was.” But, belief is not all he has.
Azevedo would go on to defeat Olympic medalists and World Champions in other competitions, not to mention finishing fourth in the world just two years later.
Injuries derailed an attempt to wrestle in the 1984 Olympic Games and he began working his way up through the coaching ladder.
In 2001, after 12 years as head coach at Calvary Chapel High School, Azevedo landed at Cal Poly as an assistant. Two years later, he became head coach.
During his time in the top spot, Azevedo has coached at least one wrestler to an individual Pac-10 Championship and to All-American status every year. Most recently, junior 141-pounder Boris Novachkov collected both honors in 2010.
Although, if there is one thing missing from Azevedo’s résumé, it’s an NCAA individual national champion.
Twice his heart was broken. Chad Mendes compiled an undefeated record in the 2007-2008 season, only to lose in the NCAA finals.
Last season, Chase Pami was the Cinderella of the NCAA tournament. As a seven seed, he was the lowest ranked wrestler to earn a spot in a title match after upsetting No. 2 Adam Hall. Unfortunately, Pami was thwarted and Azevedo was denied an NCAA champion again.
“To make it into the finals is exciting to have the chance (to win a title). Those are big matches, high pressure, but (Mendes and Pami) wrestled great,” he said, in a characteristic understatement.
Yet, no matter what happens in the final part of the season, the legacy Azevedo leaves behind is beginning to resonate now. Wrestlers on the team found it hard to characterize the intangibles their coach brought to the table, but one word kept coming up: family.
“I could always call (Azevedo) and I knew that he would be there and I knew he would back me up no matter what,” senior Filip Novachkov said. “It’s good to have that feeling that there is someone who cares a lot about everyone on the team … It’s like we’re his family.”
Ryan DesRoches has been on the team for three years and reiterated Filip’s points. The wrestling team, he said, was not a factory-like system where all wrestlers were molded in exactly the same way. Everything Azevedo did was meant to enhance the individual wrestlers performance by finding what worked best for them.
“He really cares about everyone on an individual level and wants to be able to lead them not only in their wrestling field, but by improving their life skills,” DesRoches said.
The familial aspect of his program was not lost on Azevedo and he said he consciously worked on building a special relationship with his wrestlers.
“You care about them more than just being a number, just being a body, just being a win or a loss. I think that’s how to do it,” Azevedo said. “You let them know you care about their life on and off the mat and that you are there for them regardless if they win or lose. Regardless if they make a mistake, you believe in them and you’re there for them no matter what, like a family would because you care about them.”
Azevedo has also tried to insure consistency in his family of wrestlers by promoting Mark Perry to co-head coach this year in preparation for next season when he will take over all head coaching duties.
That move, Azevedo hopes, will be one his lasting legacies at Cal Poly. The 26-year old Perry could be at Cal Poly for the long run and is adamant that his team will win championships, if the athletic department and donors support their cause financially.
“I would love to stay here. Why not? It would be great,” Perry said. “I think it all comes down to the support. I want to win and I’m gonna win team national titles in my career as a coach. That’s guaranteed, I know it’s gonna happen.”
Azevedo backs Perry’s vision and is confident that a stronger program will emerge under his leadership.
“He has a wrestling mind and he loves it,” Azevedo said. “He’s passionate, and he’s very good at it.”
But before Perry takes full control, Azevedo has one more chance to boost a wrestler to the top of the podium, something a Cal Poly wrestler has not accomplished since 1976.
Boris Novachkov might be the best hope. He has a single tally mark in the loss column with two dual meets remaining until the Pac-10 Championships.
“He has an opportunity where he could definitely be a national champion,” Azevedo said. “Just taking it one at a time and wrestling the way he is capable of wrestling, he could be the champ. That’s exciting.”
But last year Pami showed that a potential champion could come from nearly anywhere. The importance of bringing home a title for themselves and Azevedo is not lost on the wrestlers either.
“It would be great, it’s been a long go at it and I hope we do it this year,” Filip Novachkov said. “We are capable of doing it.”