Family, friends matter to Westphal-Edwards

When Tristin Westphal-Edwards won the Iowa High School Athletic Association Class 2A championship match at 182 pounds Saturday, Feb. 16, he pointed to the stands where the vast majority of Washington fans were seated. Or in that case, standing and cheering for the new Washington state champion.

Shortly after hugging Washington head coach Brent Van Weelden, Westphal-Edwards climbed into the stands to hug friends and family.

'Family is everything to me,” Westphal-Edwards said. 'I had to get in the stands right away and celebrate with my family.”

They were all celebrating his 6-5 win over Southeast Valley's Kyler Fisher, who had a 28-1 record and came into the title match with two major decisions and a win by fall in 2 minutes, 29 seconds. Westphal-Edwards entered the final with a 29-second pin, a 6-2 decision and a 6-4 win in sudden victory.

The two know each other and had been on national teams together, but Fisher had moved so the distance changed their friendship.

'We stay in contact,” Westphal-Edwards said. 'I had talked to him earlier in the season about us both being state champs because he was wrestling a weight above me, but then all of a sudden I saw on trackwrestling one day that right before the sectional tournament he had gone down to 182. So I thought, ‘well we are not both going to get to be state champs anymore. It's going to be one or the other.'”

The two had wrestled three times previously and Westphal-Edwards had won each time.

'I was confident going in and I used the fuel from my first three victories and that helped me in the way that it calmed my nerves,” Westphal-Edwards said. 'I thought about it in a way as I beat this kid three times so why not make it four. That help the nerves go away because it's never fun to go into a match with nerves.”

If any match is to make someone nervous, it is a state title bout in front of a packed house at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines.

'I think the most nervous part was just walking out there and seeing so many people and knowing all the eyes are on you because there is only three mats instead of six,” Westphal-Edwards said. 'There is a lot of nerves. I could not let it get to me because if I go into a match nervous, then I am going to be frantic and not doing the stuff that I know how to do. I just wanted to let it all flow.”

Despite his confidence and lack of nerves when the match was about to start, he knew he had a formidable opponent.

'(Fisher) had also been runner-up as a sophomore and as a junior,” Westphal-Edwards said. 'I knew it was going to be tough because we both wrestled the same style. We are both really fast. Would love to wrestle on our feet. We both like to hit a blast double. I know it was going to be tough wrestling somebody that was identical to me.”

Westphal-Edwards also had an advantage that he felt was more special than anyone else's edge.

'The big thing for me was the family and friends that were there supporting me,” he said. 'I did not want to let them down. I thought about people back home and I did not want to let them down. And then for myself, I wanted to get the state title.”

The two stalked each other for much of the first round until Westphal-Edwards scored a takedown with 14 seconds left, but Fisher escaped with 3 seconds remaining.

'That was really big. Whenever you get the first takedown it's big,” he said. 'I knew this was going to be a tight match. My goal was to make it not a tight match. I wanted to take the lead and keep running with the lead. Of course, things don't always go that way, especially in the championship match where he is a crazy good competitor too.”

The second period began with Westphal-Edwards down, but an escape within 5 seconds made the score 3-1 and when he got a takedown 30 seconds later, it was a 5-1 lead.

'When I got another takedown, I knew things were going my way,” Westphal-Edwards said.

Fisher escaped with over a minute still remaining in the second round, which ended with a 5-2 advantage for Westphal-Edwards.

Fisher started down in the third round and escaped within 5 seconds for a 5-3 score. With 30 seconds to go, Fisher tied it up with a takedown, but Westphal-Edwards escaped with 24 seconds left for a 6-5 lead.

'I know a lot of people were wondering why he let me up with under 30 seconds left,” Westphal-Edwards said. 'I think his game plan was to try to hit me with with a double because he had done that earlier in the match. It was a nice shot. I felt like he was he was confident he could get to my legs again. He let me up to give me that lead at 6-5. I think his plan was to let me up to get a takedown and win 7-6.”

That's where Westphal-Edwards' work ethic came through because all year he had worked on his leg defense.

'That definitely showed right there. That's what I have been working on. It was fun to work on it so hard in practice and then finally, it's funny how it comes down to that in your final match and that's how I won. I practiced and I practiced that. That was a very special way to win.”

For something he worked on all year to pay off in the final seconds of his final match is awesome.

'He has an obvious passion for the sport,” Van Weelden said. 'It is a very demanding sport. I would say it's the most demanding, but maybe that's not fair because I haven't coached in every sport. There's a lot of ups and downs and a season. To go the entire season undefeated, there's obviously more highs than lows.”

Westphal-Edwards achieved the highest of the highs and did so with some added motivation. He was seeded second while Fisher was first.

'I looked at it as he is coming into my weight class so he should be second, but it did not really affect me. What motivated me the most was I saw some predictions for the state tournament and those projections did not even have me in the finals. It had me winning my first two matches and then losing in the rest and that motivated me the most. I knew I would be in the finals. I knew I had what it takes to win it. When those guys were predicting things and didn't think I was a top-caliber wrestler, that really motivated me.”

That and his support from family and friends was the difference.

'When I won, the feeling was weird and I didn't really know where I was at. I mean I thought, ‘holy crap I just won.' In the videos you see me screaming and celebrating, but when it happened, I just bent down and told myself, ‘wow, I am a state champ.' It was just a crazy feeling. All I could keep doing was repeating to myself, ‘I'm a state champ. I'm a state champ.'”

Then it was off to climbing barriers to reach those most important to him.

'The hugs and the tears were great. All the hugs from my family were great. Family is everything.”

The celebrating didn't stop in the arena.

'We went back to the hotel and there was a lot of us in the hospitality room. It was great. Everybody cried and gave hugs again. I think we were up until two in the morning. We saw some kids from Lisbon that had won some titles and we saw the Highland kids. I think whoever was staying in the Marriott hotel that night and wanted to get to bed, they probably didn't get to sleep very early.

'The best part about it is I am still kind of celebrating. Everybody I've run into will say something like, ‘how's it going champ?' and that just makes me feel great.”

And in the history of Washington, he is one of the all-time greats, one of only six to be a state champion wrestler.