7-time GG champ striving for more

FOR Nisa Rodriguez, a 7-time Golden Gloves champion and fierce competitor, backing out of a bout is not in her DNA. But she’s quickly realizing that the better she gets, the more times she drapes the gloves around her neck, the less opponents are willing to step into the ring with her.

It’s a puzzling conundrum, but after all her success, Rodriguez knows nothing comes easy.

“It’s getting harder every year, the more accomplished I get,” Rodriguez said. “Last year, other girls found out I switched weight classes and everyone stepped out.”

Though she joined elite company by winning her seventh title, Rodriguez had only one bout, the championship. It went just a single round.

The disappointment of fighting in Yonkers instead of the Barclays Center for that title has only added fuel to her fire. Rodriguez said she has been training for additional weight classes to ensure she enters one where she’ll get more than a lone fight. She’s gunning for the main stage this time around.

If there’s anyone who understands Rodriguez’s predicament, it’s 10-time Gloves winner Christina Cruz, who was notorious for sending boxers sprinting for the exits. The tournament’s most decorated fighter has moved on and is staying busy preparing for Nationals and working in real estate, but she still has fond memories of her Gloves career.

“There’s no better feeling than winning a pair of Golden Gloves in your hometown,” Cruz said. “Nothing could match that feeling out of all the tournaments I’ve been in.”

With number eight on the horizon, Rodriguez knows that Cruz’s record is in sight. But she was reluctant to name 10 titles as an ultimate objective.

“That’s something that I wouldn’t want to take away from (Cruz),” Rodriguez said. “She’s been the top Golden Gloves champ for so long, so I wouldn’t want to compare me and her. My goal is to leave a mark of who I was and what I did, and just overcoming all the stereotypes and adversity I grew up with.”

There is one tangible goal that Rodriguez has her eyes on, though, even before she gets another shot at the Gloves. She’s heading to USA Nationals in Kansas City Sunday, along with Cruz, and a gold there is the one milestone that has eluded her. She’s stepped up her training in preparation, pushing herself physically with her 7-year-old son shadowboxing by her side.

“I’m starving. I want that title,” Rodriguez says.