Yianni Diakomihalis

Yianni Diakomihalis (born John Michael Diakomihalis on April 11, 1999) is an American freestyle and folkstyle wrestler who competes at 65 kilograms and 149 pounds.

In freestyle, he is the 2022 World silver medalist, a two-time US World Team member (2021 and 2022), the 2020 Pan American champion, the 2019 US Open national champion, and a two-time age-group World champion.

As a collegiate wrestler, Diakomihalis was a four-time NCAA Division I champion and four-time EIWA champion out of Cornell University.

Diakomihalis attended Hilton High School in Hilton, New York, along with his brother Greg, who would go on to become a five-time NYSPHSAA champion.

He made the varsity team in the seventh grade and won the Division I state championship at 99 pounds as an eighth grader, defeating future Cornell teammate Vito Arujau in the finals.

As a freshman, he also won the state title now at 113 pounds and that was repeated at 120 pounds as a sophomore.

As a junior, he became one of the ten four-time NYSPHSAA champions in the history of the state of New York when he walked through the competition at 138 pounds.

As a senior, he found himself unable to compete at the state championships after he suffered an injury that led him out of the tournament.

As a high school sophomore (2014), Diakomihalis committed to Cornell University.

As a freshman, Diakomihalis won the Bearcat Open, New York State Intercollegiate, and the Cliff Keen Invitational and compiled a record of 28-1 during the regular season.

Post-regular-season, he won the EIWA championships and later went on to win the NCAA championship, joining Kyle Dake as the only Big Reds to do so in their "true freshman" year of competition and earning notable victories over #1 Bryce Meredith, #2 Jaydin Eierman, and two-time NCAA champion Dean Heil.

Diakomihalis suffered a torn ACL during his quarterfinal matchup against #6 Heil.

As a sophomore, Diakomihalis won the Mat Town Open I and the South Beach Individual and capped a perfect 13–0 record in dual matches, ending the regular season unbeaten.

He went on to win his second EIWA championship and earned the Outstanding Wrestler award in the process.

At the NCAA championships, he most notably defeated the #2, #3, and #5 ranked wrestlers in Jaydin Eierman, Joseph McKenna and Dominick Demas to claim the national title.

Diakomihalis was named EIWA Top Wrestler and was a finalist for the Dan Hodge Trophy.

As a junior, he placed third at the 2016 UWW Nationals.

After opting for the Olympic redshirt, Diakomihalis attended his first senior level tournament at the US Open in April.

He went 6–0 (three technical falls) with notable wins over Frank Molinaro, Jordan Oliver and Zain Retherford in the finals.

Not long after, he competed in an exhibition match at the Beat the Streets charity event against multiple World medalist Bajrang Punia.

He won the match on points (10–8).

After winning the US Open championship, Diakomihalis sat out of the World Team Trials Challenge, having earned himself an automatic spot at Final X: Rutgers with the US Open victory; US Open finalist Retherford won the World Team Trials Challenge to earn the other spot at Final X in June.

In the first match of the best-of three series, Diakomihalis fell 10-4.

The second match ended controversially.

Retherford was down 4–6 late in the match when he got a takedown for two points, while Diakomihalis was awarded two points for a back exposure to apparently win the match 8-6, as time expired while the wrestlers were still grappling.

Retherford's corner challenged the points awarded to Diakomihalis and won the challenge, resulting in a final score of 6–6 with criteria advantage to Retherford, giving him a 2-0 lead in the series and an apparent victory at Final X. However, subsequent to the tournament, Diakomihalis initiated an arbitration challenging the scoring change.

Diakomihalis ultimately prevailed in the arbitration with a finding that the scoring review was conducted improperly.

The arbitrator awarded Diakomihalis a rematch of the second match in the series.

In July, Diakomihalis competed at the prestigious Yasar Dogu Grand Prix in Istanbul, Turkey.

He defeated four opponents such as his Final X opponent Zain Retherford, Ali Rahimzade and Ismail Musukaev to claim the championship.

Two weeks later he went on to compete in the Waclaw Ziolkowski Memorial at Warsaw, Poland.

He defeated four opponents (two technical falls) including Ismail Musukaev (by forfeit) to claim the championship.

He graduated in 2017 as a four-time NYSPHSAA champion with a 243–3 record on a win streak of 210 victories.

Diakomihalis did not compete at the NCAA level in 2019–2020, as he took an Olympic redshirt year and focused on freestyle.

Yianni planned to return to college wrestling in 2020–2021; however, the Ivy League announced the cancellation of all winter sports on November 13, 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

After 975 days, Diakomihalis finally returned to the mat for the Big Red on November 20, 2021, defeating Stanford's Jaden Abas at 149 pounds.

He finished 28-0 and won his third NCAA title (his first at 149 pounds).

Diakomihalis finished his college career with his fourth title at the NCAA tournament in Tulsa (his second title at 149 pounds) with a 4-2 victory over Sammy Sasso of Ohio State University.

Diakomihalis became the fifth wrestler in NCAA history, and the second from Cornell University, to win four NCAA titles.

Diakomihalis was an accomplished cadet freestyle wrestler, he was a two-time World champion and two-time UWW National champion.