Iowa women’s wrestling’s path to next national championship might have new obstacles

CORALVILLE — As Iowa women’s wrestling took home its second consecutive national championship, its depth was clearly on display.

Iowa, after sending the maximum of 15 wrestlers to the national championships, had 15 All-Americans (and had a wrestler scoring substantial team points at all 10 weight classes).

“And really honestly, we have more (wrestlers) that maybe didn’t get the opportunity to compete this weekend,” Iowa Coach Clarissa Chun said. “They’re wanting their chance.”

Early signs point toward the Hawkeyes being the favorites to win a national title again in 2026. After all, the Hawkeyes could be returning as many as 11 All-Americans and still are the only power-conference intercollegiate program.

The path to a third consecutive national championship might have some new obstacles, though, especially with the NCAA taking over administration of the sport.

One possible change that has garnered plenty of speculation is whether teams will only be able to send 10 wrestlers to the national tournament — like what the NCAA does on the men’s side — rather than the current 15.

Had that change taken effect in this year, that would have meant five fewer opportunities for Iowa wrestlers to earn All-America status (or compete in the National Collegiate Women’s Wrestling Championships at all for that matter).

That may present an opening for other programs to cut into the Hawkeyes’ dominant position in the sport. Colorado Mesa’s Travis Mercado believes the “parity is going to shift dramatically” across the sport.

“Not everybody’s going to get the No. 1 girl every year,” Mercado said. “We can’t anymore. We can’t just keep piling on those No. 1 girls. … If we’re at 10, is someone going to want to sit behind — we’ll use Jennesis Martinez as an example — is someone going to want to sit behind a girl that’s a four-time All-American for a year, two years?”

Iowa already has experienced this with Bella Mir, who transferred to North Central College after placing fifth nationally last year at 155 pounds as a Hawkeye.

She would have had to either compete with Olympic silver medalist Kennedy Blades at 160 or both 2024 national champion Reese Larramendy and eventual 2025 national champion Macey Kilty at 145.

Instead, Mir thrived at North Central in 2024-25. She defeated Iowa’s Larramendy in the NCWWC semifinals and finished as the runner-up after losing to Kilty in the championship round.

Chun has focused on being “as transparent as we can with where we’re at and where we’re heading” amid the potential upcoming changes.

“Our freshmen that we recruited this year and transfers that we recruited this year and here on out — it really was having those conversations early on in the recruiting process,” Chun said. “I didn’t want it to be a surprise for anyone.”

Even with being able to take 15 wrestlers to NCWWC the last two years, Iowa’s national team titles have not exactly been cakewalks.

The Hawkeyes did not clinch their 2024 title until Kylie Welker’s win in the final match of the championship round. They had a more comfortable margin in 2025, but even then, the Hawkeyes did not clinch the title until midway through the championship round.

“We’ve got teams on our tail,” Chun said.

Comments: john.steppe@thegazette.com

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