Spending part of his childhood in Orlando, Noah Castillo had a lot of time to get acclimated to his Puerto Rican culture as the Florida city has one of the largest communities in the country.
He'd lost a small part of that when he moved to Chattanooga to wrestle for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, but recently he'd gotten a chance to rediscover some of those roots when he was invited to wrestle for Puerto Rico in the U23 World Championships in Albania.
He was there with UTC head coach Kyle Ruschell, which gave him an opportunity to build the relationship with the two. Some of the other wrestlers on the Puerto Rican team had wrestled collegiately as well, which also gave him an opportunity to build friendships.
"You find yourself getting distanced from your heritage, where you're from, your roots," said Castillo, whose mother is Puerto Rican. "To be able to bring Puerto Rican wrestling and be able to bring family into it was cool. They'd bought shirts and helped me get out there, so being able to bring my whole family together meant a lot.
"Now, whenever I go back home, I feel like people are supporting me more and they understand that I'm still competing at a high level."
Castillo lost both of his matches against international competition back in October, but having that level of training was pretty invaluable for the Moc junior as there is no substitute for the sort of high-level training at a point in the calendar year when most are just on the mats practicing.
He's used that extra time to start off hot for the Mocs, with an 8-0 record heading into the second day of the Southern Scuffle at McKenzie Arena. That run ended with a pair of wins and a pair of losses to finish fourth at 149 pounds, one of four Mocs to reach the medal stand at the event.
Isaiah Powe was the highest finisher, taking third at 141 pounds to become the first UTC freshman to medal in the event since Nick Soto was second in 2012. Along with Castillo, Blake Boarman took a fourth-place finish at 133 pounds, while Austin Paradice finished seventh at 157 pounds. The four place finishers gave the Mocs an eighth-place team finish with 63.5 points, UTC's first top-10 finish in the event since placing seventh in 2012.
Brayden Palmer — who joined Castillo, Powe and 197-pounder David Harper as seeded UTC competitors in the event — suffered an injury Monday which knocked the 125-pounder out of contention.
"I learned a lot while I was there," Castillo said. "I learned that there's different levels of wrestling, and the guys across the world are training at the highest level. And the guys in America, a lot of the collegiate wrestlers haven't even seen that level, nor felt it, and the fact that I was able to feel it and take it back here and understand that these guys are just at different levels, it's helped me a lot, especially being on such a big stage in the World Championships."
But Castillo was built for wrestling. He was the youngest of four kids growing up until his family adopted a little brother when he was 13, so he was "wrestled around and thrown against the wall" as a kid. By the time he was 3 years old, he'd developed a single leg takedown and "two other moves." He still does some of the same things he did back when he was 6, albeit at a higher level now that he's at the Division I level.
So now with the world championships over with, and the Scuffle in the rear-view, he can focus his energy on helping the Mocs compete for a Southern Conference championships as well as some individual honors as well.
"He's a great leader on and off the mat," Ruschell said recently. "He does the right things, but this summer, we saw it even more. He's made his goals a priority in his training and how he carries himself in what he does off the mat. You can see it in his wrestling and in how he talks, how we walks, how he looks.
"Everything is to be an All-American, and he's doing a great job leading by example. When he talks, guys listen."
The Mocs get back into dual competition on Jan. 13 at Lindenwood.
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com.