Time was that Mike Funk, who wrestled for four seasons at Northwestern University, could hang with his son, Quinn, an undefeated senior at Legacy High School.
Mike could always show Quinn a thing or two, and he even muscled the kid around the wrestling mat.
Not anymore.
“I wrestled with him all of the way through, ever since he was a kid,” said Mike, 55, who’s a volunteer coach at Legacy. “But as Quinn has gotten bigger and faster and stronger, the injuries are starting to pile up on these old bones. There’s a broken bone here and a bruise there.”
Mike listed a chronic neck problem, bad knees, a dislocated finger, and, most recently, popped cartilage in his ribs after tussling with Quinn.
“I finally had to say, ‘I’m done,’ go wrestle with your brothers,” Mike said with a hearty laugh.
More on the Funk Brothers in a moment.
Friday night, Quinn pinned Legend senior Nathan Sandy in 3 minutes, 21 seconds, in the 215-pound Class 5A semifinals to advance to Saturday’s championship match of the CHSAA state wrestling tournament. That’s where Quinn, boasting a 46-0 record, will meet Cherry Creek senior Jake Howell as he attempts to win his second straight state crown.
“I just wanted to improve this year and I think I have,” said Quinn, who has an offer to wrestle for Division I Binghamton University, a prestigious public school in upstate New York. “I think a lot of guys were starting to figure out my moves, so I’ve worked on some new tactics and I’m being a little bit more creative.”
It’s not lost on Quinn that he wears the name “Legacy” across his wrestling singlet. He had four talented wrestling brothers come before him. Three of the Quinn brothers — Nolan, Aidan and Gavin — made the state finals. None of them won gold.
But Quinn did last year by breaking his brothers’ self-proclaimed “Funk Curse” by sticking Grandview’s Maxwell Kibbee in the Class 5A 190-pound finals. Quinn had to beat the bracket’s top seed, Ponderosa’s Westin Hoffschneider, in a gritty semifinal bout.
This year, Quinn admitted, he’s felt some pressure to repeat.
“I’ve definitely felt the target on my back this year,” he said. “Trying to win another state title is not easy, but I’ve gotten better as the season has gone on.”
His dad does not doubt that Quinn is a much better wrestler now than he was even a year ago, in part because Nolan and Aidan, who both wrestled for the Colorado School of Mines before graduating over the last two years, have worked over their younger brother for years. They still get on the mat with Quinn during Legacy practices.
“Quinn’s improved technically, and he’s improved his mindset as far as practice and match preparation,” Mike said. “He’s really starting to pick up on the intangibles of the sport. It’s really helped to have his older brothers around him to impart their knowledge and wisdom to Quinn.”
When push comes to shoves and takedowns, Mike still thinks that Nolan and Adian would win a match against Quinn.
“College wrestling, whether it’s Division I or Division II, like Mines, is a big step up,” Mike said. “You wrestle at a fast pace and you wrestle at a higher level of intensity. Quinn is starting to catch on to that and he’s learned that, ‘This might work in high school but it’s not going to work in college.’ ”
Quinn is proud of his family’s wrestling legacy and the lessons it’s taught him.
“You are out there on the mat alone and it’s a tough sport,” he said. “It builds you for things later in life. It builds character.”
Whether Quinn wins or loses Saturday night, the Funk family will be done with high school wrestling. There’s a bittersweet feeling filtering through the Funk home.
“My wife, Colleen, is waiting for the day we can go for a vacation over Christmas,” Mike said with a wry smile.
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