NCAA Division II Wrestling Championships return to Cedar Rapids in 2027

Future sites for the NCAA Wrestling Championships were announced Wednesday.

One of the tournaments is returning to Eastern Iowa.

The 2027 NCAA Division II national tournament will be held at Alliant Energy PowerHouse in Cedar Rapids and Upper Iowa will be the host. This marks the fourth time hosting for the Peacocks Athletics Department and Cedar Rapids with the most recent in 2023.

“We are excited to share the news today that Upper Iowa University has been chosen to host the 2027 NCAA Division II Wrestling Championships in Cedar Rapids,” Upper Iowa's Vice President for Athletics Rick Hartzell said in a news release. :We see the NCAA's selection of Upper Iowa and Cedar Rapids as a testament to the work that we have done collectively to put together one of the finest championship weekends across all sports within the NCAA. We can't wait to begin work in the planning process with the great people at Cedar Rapids Tourism to spotlight the sport of wrestling, the proud alumni of Upper Iowa, the great people and personalities of Cedar Rapids and put on another epic event for all the student-athletes, coaches and fans involved.“

The event will be held March 12-13, 2027. Upper Iowa Coach Heath Grimm said he loved the news the Peacocks will host the tournament again.

‘“We preform well on ‘home soil,’” Grimm said in a message with The Gazette. “(Chase) Luensman won a title, (Josh) Walker won a title and (Maleek) Williams was runner-up and the team brings home a trophy.

“We love Cedar Rapids. Us hosting every four years allows every single guy a chance to win a title with us hosting at some point during their career at Upper Iowa.”

The brackets will consist of 18 wrestlers per weight for 180 total, qualifying from six super regionals.

The 2028 tournament will be in Pittsburgh, Pa. Cedar Rapids hosted the 2008, 2018 and 2013 D-II Wrestling Championships. Upper Iowa also hosted the 2013 D-II Volleyball Championships here.

“The enthusiasm and interest from around the country to host NCAA championships continues to be a testament to the quality of our events,” NCAA Senior Vice President of Championships Lynda Tealer said in the news release. “For this cycle we incorporated more data into the process to help our sport and oversight committees through the evaluation and selection of sites as we had so many quality venues and locations looking to host during these two seasons. We will continue to evaluate and gather feedback on going from the traditional four-year cycle to awarding championship bids for two years to determine the right cadence for the bid process in the future.”

NCAA Division I Wrestling Championshps future sites

More future sites for all three NCAA divisions were announced. The Division I Championships will be held in St. Louis, Mo., in 2027 and U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis in 2028. U.S. Bank Stadium was the site for the 2020 national tournament that was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The D-I Championships are set for Philadelphia in 2025 and Cleveland in 2026.

The D-III Championships will be held at Alliant Energy PowerHouse in Cedar Rapids in 2026 and Providence, R.I. in 2025.

The NCAA Committee announced La Crosse, Wis., will be the site for the 2028 D-III Championships, but the 2027 site will be announced at a later date.

According to the Upper Iowa press release, this is the fourth time the NCAA conducted a comprehensive site selection process, putting most of its championships up for bid simultaneously. The NCAA chose over 240 host sites for preliminary and final rounds of predetermined championships across Divisions I, II and III, primarily for the 2026-27 and 2027-28 seasons. This cycle marked a shift from a four-year to a two-year site selection process.

The release noted the NCAA received more than 1,200 bids from member schools, conferences, cities and sports commissions across 47 states and Washington, D.C., all competing to host predetermined rounds for 87 of the NCAA's 90 championships. The respective NCAA sports committees selected the sites, with final approval from the divisional competition oversight and championships committees.

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