Cooper Mathews loves wrestling, but he is ready for a break.
The Cherokee Trail High School senior-to-be has been on the mat endlessly for months, as his season didn’t end when he won his second career Class 5A boys wrestling state championship in February at Ball Arena.
Mathews traded the Cougars singlet in for one representing the United States in the past few months, which culminated with an appearance for his country at the U17 world championships in Baku, Azerbaijan, in late July.
“It was a super awesome long journey that started right after state,” Mathews said. “Usually I take a little bit of time off after state, but not this time.”
Indeed, Mathews — who has made a 5A state championship match in all three of his varsity prep seasons, which included a 13-4 win over Grandview’s Kyle Menuez in the 132 pound final Feb. 21 — kept on going. He departed for Panama City, Panama, in early April and won U17 Pan Am gold in both Greco and freestyle disciplines, then captured a Greco title at the U.S. Open in Las Vegas to secure his spot on the American team in the 60 kg weight class.
His preparation was thrown off by injury, as he said he was in a cast for 5 1/2 weeks and also suffered a severe sprain to an ankle that definitely had an affect on his performance.
The U17 world championships — contested at the National Gymnastics Arena in Baku — featured qualifiers from many countries.
Mathews first faced a wrestler from Armenia (Artush Petrosyan) and got behind early, but rallied for a 12-4 victory, which sent him forward in the bracket into a matchup against a foe from Japan in Hinata Hanamori. This time, Mathews was unable to adjust to his opponent’s strengths and ended up suffering a 9-4 loss that derailed his quest for gold.
The tournament, however, featured repechage, which means the wrestlers who lose early can be brought back into the bracket to wrestle for the bronze medal if the opponent who defeated them moves into the final. Mathews would have had a shot at the bronze if he’d made it through the second round, as the top seed from Azerbaijan continued all the way on to final. But Hanamori made it instead and lost, which ended Mathews’ tournament and put him in ninth place overall.
Mathews came home empty handed in terms of medals, but his wrestling acumen grew by leaps and bounds.
“One thing I noticed is that wrestlers from other countries are really strong at pushing and they’ve been doing it their whole lives,” he said. “I talked to some of them with translator apps and they told me they pick and choose their style when they are super young and focus on that for the rest of their careers. I started Greco at 14, but they started much younger, so is a completely different game. Wrestling is wrestling, but there’s definitely so much difference.”
Off the mat, Mathews’ favorite part about the trip was getting to know wrestlers from other countries, including some from Iran.
“Politics aside, they were really nice to me,” he said. “Even though we are at war with them, we traded clothes and just got to know each other.”
The international experience, plus the significant time he spent at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs as he recovered from injury, helped him progress tremendously.
In between all of the competition, Mathews had time to put an end to a quick search for where he will wrestle in college.
His older brother, Chance, is currently at the Air Force Academy, but Cooper chose another path and committed to South Dakota State, which will join the Pac-12 conference for wrestling in the upcoming year.
“The program really felt like home, they have a degree I want to pursue and they have a good wrestling team, so it checked all the boxes,” said Mathews, who added he had looked at Air Force, but his personality didn’t fit the same as his older brother.
Mathews have a lot to look forward to in his senior year.
He already holds the distinction as the only multiple-time state champion for coach Jeff Buck’s Cherokee Trail program and he will try to add to his record with a third, though he doesn’t yet know what weight class he will end up in. Mathews has racked up 145 wins in three seasons and will take aim at the Colorado career record for wins, which is currently 189 (held by Glenwood Springs’ Myles Wilson and Air Academy’s David Burchett Jr.).
On top of that, his younger brother, Crosby, will be a freshman and they will get to share a season together, like Cooper did with his older brother.
“I’m just trying to take some time off and get healed up right now, but I’m excited for senior year,” he said.
Courtney Oakes is Aurora Sentinel Sports Editor. Reach him at sports@sentinelcolorado.com. Twitter/X: @aurorasports. IG: Sentinel Prep Sports
