California native Rodriguez rediscovered love of sport at small Doane U in Nebraska

Photo: Cristelle Rodriguez, a native of California, became the first women’s NAIA champ last March for Diane University in Crete, Neb.

By Mike Finn

Where in the heck is Crete, Neb.?

That’s a question anyone in this country, including perhaps someone from the Cornhusker State might ask, much less an 18-year-old native of Clovis, Calif.

That had to be one of the first questions Cristelle Rodriguez asked when she first spoke to Dana Vote, the Director of Wrestling at Doane University, about her joining the first-ever women’s wrestling program in 2022.

“When I drove from California to Nebraska, I was like, ‘Oh my goodness, where am I?’, she recalled about her 1,600-mile trek from her home in California to this community, which sits an hour southwest of Lincoln with a population of 7,400 people. “I was crying and saying, ‘Take me back.’”

But she did continue her journey east, and her connection with Crete and this private school with an enrollment of 1,800 students. It also solidified her love for the sport and this community; especially when the 123-pound wrestler became the school’s first NAIA champion last March.

This article first appeared in the early November issue of WIN Magazine. Click on the cover or call 888-305-0606 to subscribe.

The first words that Rodriguez thinks of are “crazy and amazing,” when describing her wrestling journey, which also includes a U20 World championship at 55 kilos this past September in Pontevedra, Spain.

“The crazy part was I didn’t think I could do this,” said Rodriguez. “I always use the phrase that the door is opened by God. If it’s God’s will, it’s going to happen, and I had all my faith in God and my coaches. But it’s actually crazy it came true. I’m still in shock with that.

“The amazing part is how far I’ve come and how much I overcame.”

The bigger concern Rodriguez and Vote faced two years ago was whether she even wanted to wrestle … any place …. after she quit the sport her final two years at Clovis High School. She first won a California state championship at Buchanan High School and a Cadet World silver medal in 2019.

One of the problems was that the pandemic shut down the sport in states like California. The other dealt with pressures she felt from a strong wrestling tradition in the central part of the state and questioned the sincerity of her supporters.

“Their whole mindset of wrestling and the way they treated me was not good at all,” she recalled. “I felt like they under-minded women’s wrestling. I didn’t get the support that I needed. But once I started winning and they noticed me, I felt like people were sucking up to me. That was putting pressure on me, and I felt that if I lost, they were going to go back to where they were. I just lost my love for the sport right then and fell into a black hole.”

Dana Vote, the director of wrestling at Doane, was with Cristelle Rodriguez last summer when she won a U20 World championship.

But Rodriquez also made friends from her younger wrestling days, who brought sunshine back into her life. One of whom was Karina Vang, now a 103-pound junior at Doane, a native of nearby Fresno, Calif., and wrestler from Herbert Hoover High School, who suggested that Vote contact Rodriquez, who had taken up jiu-jitsu in absence from wrestling.

“Karina told me that Cristelle needed to get out of California and that she needed wrestling,” recalled Vote, who was leading the men’s team at Doane when the school asked him to create a women’s program. “When I talked to her, it depended on what mood she was in. She was scared of the challenge, but I could tell that she wanted to do it.

“One of the promises I gave her was that I would be her coach,” said Vote, who continues to be in her corner, whether its assisting Doane’s head women’s coach Julian Gaytan or when she and other Tiger teammates compete in the off-season in freestyle.

“We talked about wanting her to love the sport again and not putting pressure on herself. I said I wanted to get her in the right headspace, get a degree and love the sport by not forcing her to wrestle right away.”

Vote said that all changed when she entered a tournament that first season. He also is proud that she also has grown into a two-time Academic All-American at Doane.

Was Rodriguez ever concerned that people might have forgotten about her?

“Yes and no,” she said. “I feel like people underestimated me when I came back. No one thought of me as a rising star. They knew about me and my talent, but there was some doubt.”

With all her success in wrestling, Vote jokes that Rodriguez has a love-hate relationship with the sport. She agrees.

“There are some times where I say I hate this sport and say, ‘What am I doing this for? There is no purpose,” she said. “It gets hard at times, and to be disciplined all the time is hard when your friends ask you to go eat or have a girls’ night and I can’t because I’m training. The world’s idea of being young is that you go out and party. But you can’t do that if you want to succeed.”

And it wasn’t like everything was rosy for Rodriquez in her first year in Nebraska. First, she settled for third in the 2023 NAIA nationals, then got food poisoning at the 2023 UWW U20 World championships.

“That was horrible,” she recalled, but also remembers those moments helped her define herself as a wrestler.

“I gave wrestling my all before, but I still knew that I could give more. From that point on, I said that was never going to happen again. I was nervous that I even made those teams so I lost myself in being nervous.”

After she won the U20 Worlds, where she won all four bouts either by pin or technical fall, she said, “I felt so happy and I could cry today because it’s so emotional, thinking about all those tears at a practice and all those sacrifices.”

Rodriguez credits her coaches, teammates, her fiancé Benjamin Dobler, a native of Hungary and member of the Doane men’s wrestling team, and her faith for helping her adjust to her college life.

“I did turn my back away from Him in those two years,” she said. “I was feeling empty or there was no point to anything.”

Rodriquez also credits her family – including parents Saul and Jerri, who served as her first coaches when she took up the sport. 

“They had the fight in them,” said Cristelle, who is studying exercise science at Doane and hopes to return to California and create her own construction company like her father.

“He would take me out to the fields and work and we would get into heavy machinery like bulldozers and I really liked it,” she recalled.

Cristelle was also sandwiched between two older brothers and two younger brothers, who wrestled. She took up the sport because she got bored just watching.

Rodriguez is also aware that girls and women’s wrestling has exploded in the past few years and realizes that other girls might also have trouble in dealing with the pressures of the sport.

She would like to be an advocate for those girls.

“I know some girls get the support and some do not,” she said. “It depends where you are and who your coaches are and who wants to add the respect for you to wrestle. 

“I want to be the source where young female wrestlers are able to contact me about the physical part of wrestling or the mental part or even their home lives.

“I don’t want them to think that I’m too good or can’t talk to them. I really love when they come asking questions and I’ll answer right away.”

Yes, Rodriquez faced lots of questions throughout her journey to Doane. Fortunately, rediscovering her love of wrestling and life were ones she has answered.