In the fall of 1973, freshly cut from the seventh-grade basketball team, Michael DerGarabedian followed his older brother Dean, an eighth grader, into the Baldwin Junior High School cafeteria and was introduced to the sport of wrestling.

That day, according to Michael, was the onset of a 40-year relationship with the “finest teacher” in the world.

Wrestling was a surrogate teacher to Michael and he took wrestling like an obedient student, eager to learn and anxious to please.

Under Clark Crespi, one of Long Island’s unheralded wrestling coaches, Michael went undefeated in eighth grade and ninth grade. He won the Nassau County, Suffolk County, New York State and Eastern Coast Nationals titles.

In high school, under the tutelage of Iowa State Hall of Fame All-American Steve Shippos, Michael finished third twice and won a Nassau County title while also finishing fifth in the 1980 New York State Championships and winning the Outstanding Wrestler award at the prestigious Pittsburgh Classic.

Michael’s love for the sport and excellence on the mat earned him a scholarship to the University of Michigan, wrestling for Dale Bahr and Joe Wells from 1980-1985. He earned a spot in the starting lineup in four of those years and placed in the Big Ten Championships multiple times.

A nationally ranked wrestler, Michael was faced with a life-altering decision in his last season, wrestle in the Big Ten Championships or sit for the Law School Admission Test. Governed by a "wrestling lesson," he chose the latter and never looked back. Upon graduating law school, Michael accepted a job in Hartford, Connecticut.

While there, he continued to volunteer as an assistant coach at Central Connecticut University with head coach Ken Destefanis.

Michael moved back to Long Island in 1990 and “hung a shingle” in Rockville Centre.

He continued to use the “mat lessons” to build what is now considered to be one of New York’s most prominent law firms.

Michael is consistently quoted in local papers, national legal publications, and has been featured on primetime television legal documentaries.

His trial record is unmatched by any other attorney in our region, and he attributes all of his success, in and out of the courtroom, to one “wrestling lesson”: “No one will ever outwork me.”

Michael always finds the time to assist the wrestling community.

You can always find him offering free legal services and support to any wrestler in need, or spending many evenings a week instilling his love for the sport to the newest generation of wrestlers at the club he started five years ago, the Teeth of the Dog Wrestling Club at North Shore High School.

The Teeth of the Dog Wrestling Club was started, according to Michael, in a “dual effort to continue to pay back the sport of wrestling that continues to give him so much while simultaneously teaching his four sons the virtues of wrestling, which has become the cornerstone of his character.”

Unbeknownst to Michael, the sport taught him yet another lesson, “the power of a generous heart.” Michael has approximately 30 elementary school athletes whom he now considers his own children and their parents his dear friends.

He received the Lifetime Service to Wrestling award from the Downstate New York Chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2012.