It’s not surprising that Kalaheo coach Kevin Kawamoto makes a point of mentioning a dog while recalling the time he was getting to know wrestler Rysan Leong.
Pet dogs are usually obedient and playfully aggressive. Oh, and they love their proverbial bones. Well, Leong fits that bill in human ways.
“When he was a freshman going to be a sophomore, he told me, ‘I want to do good in wrestling,’ ” Kawamoto said. “Every night, I would go to his house and teach him until 9 at night. He had this 30-by-30-foot patch of grass and there was this little (black chihuahua terrier). Rysan would be there without fail and I would have a captive audience for two hours.”
One time, Kawamoto forgot to tell Leong he wouldn’t be there and so Leong called his coach 20 minutes after the scheduled meeting time.
“I told him, ‘Sorry, I forgot to call you. You are outside waiting? You can go inside now and take a shower. I’m not coming.’ ” the coach said. “He was diligent. It showed how hungry the kid is.”
Like dogs who salivate over those bones, Leong just can’t get enough of wrestling.
“I never stop wrestling,” said Leong, the reigning 160-pound state champion who will be going for the 170-pound title Feb. 20-21 at Blaisdell Arena.
Never stopping or holding back is also a good description of his style on the mat.
“As a wrestler, I never stop, always pushing in matches and going as hard as I can and as fast as I can and trying to push my opponent as hard as I can,” he said. “I don’t like to sit and wait. I like to be aggressive and control the pace of the match.”
Leong made a big impression on Kawamoto.
“I was an assistant coach and was asked to be the head coach,” Kawamoto said. “I was really hesitating. It takes a lot to build a program. I turned down the AD twice and the former coach was kind of badgering me. Rysan was the reason I stayed.”
Leong, who is undefeated this season, wants to wrestle in college and be a UFC fighter some day. He’s in contact with the coach at Warner Pacific (Portland, Ore.) and he has applied to a bunch of other schools, mostly in Oregon and California. Kawamoto said Leong probably won’t make a college decision until April, after he heads to a national tournament in Virginia.
“That may propel him to get looks from D-I and D-II schools,” the coach said.
This is the kind of beast opponents at 170 can expect to see in Leong at states:
“Rysan has the quickness of somebody 132 pounds and the strength of someone 195 pounds,” Kawamoto said. “He can do stuff I haven’t seen in a while. He’s super fast and he’s super light. He’s been training since last season and hasn’t take a day off. He’s got major cracks. He’s up for any challenge and … we call him ‘Zen’ because nothing really bothers him. That’s the kind of kid he is.
“His strength on the mat is he can feel what you’re going to do and knows what you’re going to do before you do it. With that comes scrambling. He can scramble like mainland kids can scramble. He can do stuff like crazy.”
Leong is obsessed with getting better. He watched the video of last year’s OIA championship, a 12-6 loss to Pearl City’s Makoa Cooper, “a million times.”
“I analyzed it and figured out how he wrestled and what to do and prepared my body and all my techniques for states,” he said. “What I noticed was my positioning needed to be fixed. I was shooting wild out in the open. When it came to states, I wrestled smarter.”
The result: a 4-3 victory.
A story that illustrates Leong’s toughness came in a tournament at Kaiser.
“A kid from Radford shot in super hard and the side of my mouth ran into his hip,” Leong said. “I felt a chalky feeling, but I kept wrestling. When the ref blew his whistle, I reached into my mouth and pulled out half of my molar, threw it toward my coach and kept wrestling.”
Two of Leong’s siblings wrestled for Kalaheo, brother Ryan and sister Star.
“Ryan wrestled one year and Star wrestled two,” he said. “I wanted to go all the way with it. I love being around it.”
Leong said he plans to major in business in college and, if he doesn’t fulfill his dream of being a UFC fighter, would be interested in a management position with an MMA organization.
But his “dream goal” of being in the UFC octagon is the ultimate bone.
RYSAN LEONG
>> School: Kalaheo
>> Sports: Wrestling, judo
>> Grade: Senior
>> Height: 5 feet 11
>> Weight class: 170 pounds
>> College commitment: Undecided
>> Possible college major: Business
>> Possible career path: Management
>> Favorite pro sports team: Dallas Cowboys
>> Favorite TV show: “The Flash”
>> Favorite movies: “Karate Kid” series, “Rocky” movies, Bruce Lee movies
>> Hobbies: Bodyboarding, hanging out at Kailua Beach
>> Favorite pro athlete: UFC’s Tyron Woodley
>> Family: Father Ryan, mother Jean, brother Ryan Dean, sister Star, half brother Royal, half sister Jojo, grandmother Susan, dog Riley (the black chihuahua terrier)
>> Some coaches: Kevin Kawamoto, Isaac Ruiz, Rob Hesia, Makoa Hanaike
