Kyle Combs '22 Recruiting Profile

I'll start with a quick story of how I knew wrestling was the sport for me; It was in middle school when my dad and I went down to the Citadel to watch my cousin who wrestled at NC State. I was glued to the mat and loved everything the sport was about, it was from that moment that I was hooked. I continued with baseball and football but decided to add wrestling to the mix. I was runner up my seventh-grade year and conference champ my eighth-grade year but ended up hurting my shoulder in baseball which affected me for my freshman year. That's when I decided to step back from baseball and just focus on wrestling and football, fast forward to my sophomore year I took a hit to the knee running the ball in football right before wrestling season was about to start, ended up being a torn meniscus. This cost me my sophomore year, with the exception of a few matches. I made the decision to quit football for my Junior year to focus on reaching my goal of becoming a D1 Collegiate wrestler.  I've spent the last year and a half since my surgery training hard and traveling all over picking the toughest tournaments. I knew I had a lot of catching up to do. With that being said, I've had my fair share of losses along the way with wrestling some of the best kids in the Nation but here I am now. I transferred to Summerville High School in South Carolina for my junior year due to concerns of North Carolina, where I am originally from not having a wrestling season at all because of covid.  Even though I had been wrestling on a club team and traveling all year, I knew the importance of being apart of a successful high school program. We as a team were lower state 5A champions, and runner up at States. On a personal record,  I have worked very hard to obtain first place in my region, qualify for states, and was runner up at the 5A SC individual state championship.

I would say I am different from other recruits because unlike a lot of wrestlers who go on to the next level, I haven't been wrestling since I was six years old. I found the love for this sport a little later than most but just how far I've come in such a short amount of time makes me pumped to see what the future has in store. I have also been blessed with the opportunity to have some unique training experiences that a lot of people haven't had. All of which have helped get me to where I am at today.

I believe I am a good candidate for a collegiate level team because I have seen what it's like to lose and overcome that; I have seen what it's like to face adversity with two back-to-back injuries and have to come back twice as hard to keep up. I am not afraid to work hard, I have the grit and the determination that it takes to be at the collegiate level. I have played team sports my entire life and I know the importance of being a coachable athlete and putting your team first.