Jamestown Community College wrestling coach Kris Schimek is pictured during his second Rough N’ Rowdy middleweight amateur boxing bout, which he won via knockout. Submitted photo

When working with his wrestlers at Jamestown Community College, coach Kris Schimek tries to stress the importance of mental toughness, and seizing opportunities when they come along.

Recently, he had the chance to put that message to work in his own life.

Schimek currently holds a 2-0 record after a pair of amateur boxing fights with the Rough N’ Rowdy promotion, which was recently acquired by Barstool Sports and featured a card including Jose Canseco on Feb. 5.

In his most recent bout, Schimek — a former NJCAA All-American wrestler — scored a knockout win against Branson Riggleman at the Hollywood Casino in Charles Town, West Virginia.

“It has been a wild ride,” Schimek said. “It is a lot of fun honestly. I tried the mixed martial arts thing because wrestling fits kind of into that. But something about boxing, it is primal, it is fun and I’ve really enjoyed the process so far.”

A graduate of Pine Valley High School, Schimek’s collegiate wrestling career began at Niagara County Community College were he was a national finalist in his first season at 165 pounds. After earning All-American honors as a sophomore, Schimek moved on to Ithaca College where he was named an All-American again as a junior before leaving school after the birth of his first child.

In addition to beginning his coaching career with the Jayhawks in 2017, Schimek has continued to train his own fighting skills while also working full time as a police officer.

“I always wanted to do it when I was younger,” Schimek said of fighting. “When I was probably 17, I decided I wanted to do it. I started training when I was wrestling at Niagara and actually I got kicked in the ribs and broke a rib. My coach found out how I did it and he put the kibosh on that. He was pretty upset with me. So at that point I was like, maybe I’ll just wait until I’m done wrestling and then I’ll start.”

While still wrestling at Niagara, Schimek began expanding his skills to mixed martial arts, training kickboxing and jiu-jitsu while fighting on the amateur circuit.

While he enjoyed his time inside of the cage, boxing offers a more focused opportunity to continue fighting.

“I originally started with mixed martial arts,” Schimek said. “Doing MMA fights and just kind of between coaching and work– my kids are getting school-aged — it is hard to train for mixed martial arts because you need to train everything if you want to be good. As opposed to the boxing, where I can just focus on boxing and it doesn’t take up nearly as much time.”

This fall, Schimek decided to roll the dice with an application to Rough N’ Rowdy to fight in their middleweight division, which runs from 154-184 pounds, and features bouts of three one-minute rounds.

As is often the case in the fight game, his chance to fill in on Oct. 24 against Alex Beaudrealt came at the last minute.

“I think honestly I got lucky to get into it in the first place,” Schimek said. “It is a pretty big organization. I think the last one they sold a half-million pay-per-views, but it is all amateur. I put an application in and I think I just got lucky. They had a cancellation and they called me six days out from the fight and asked me if I wanted one. I said ‘Yup I’m ready to go.'”

After a COVID-19 test and bloodwork, Schimek was ready for his first boxing bout, winning a unanimous decision against Beaudrealt.

With fighter and promotion pleased with the results from that contest, Schimek booked his second fight against Riggleman for Feb. 5.

“His claim to fame was that he was an undefeated street fighter,” Schimek said. “I kind of expected him to come out and try to brawl, which is exactly what he did. He kind of came out with reckless abandon, throwing everything that he could. The first round my whole game plan was just weather the storm, pick my punches, take some jabs here or there and kind of wear him out. I hit him with a good overhand right and I saw his glove drop, he broke his nose somewhere in the first so he was already having a tough time breathing, so once I saw his gloves drop in the third I put together like an 11-punch combo without a return punch. He dropped and he was done.”

As part of the promotion, donations are made for every knockout to the Barstool Fund, which was established to help small businesses during the pandemic.

“It was a fantastic feeling,” Schimek said. “Once I knew that, I really wanted to get that knockout. I was raised by small-business owners. All my family owns small businesses still to this day, so it means a lot to me. Once I got it I was super excited.”

The card was a win-win for Schimek, with the No. 1 middleweight contender suffering a loss, opening the door for a bigger fight in the coming months.

“I’d like to think there is a good chance at getting a title shot,” Schimek said.

Training for his fights, Schimek has spent time at Kinetix Combat Sports and Fitness in Falconer, and of course has the support of all his Jayhawk wrestlers.

“It was awesome for me,” he said. “I think the biggest take away from it is — I always preach to the guys, I coach being tough and the Spartan mindset and mental toughness. I looked at it like, what better way to show them than by doing it?”