Coralville’s Xtream Arena to host first NCAA women’s wrestling championships in 2026

CORALVILLE — The first-ever NCAA women’s wrestling championships will take place in the University of Iowa’s backyard.

The NCAA has named Xtream Arena in Coralville as the finals site for the 2026 championships, with the University of Iowa and the Iowa City Area Sports Commission serving as co-hosts, according to the governing body’s official report from this month’s sports oversight committee meeting.

The 2026 finals will take place during the first full weekend of March, according to the NCAA report, with the six regionals occurring two weekends before that. (It is a similar format to what the National Collegiate Women’s Wrestling Championships used in 2025.)

“We couldn’t be more honored to have been chosen as the inaugural host of these NCAA championships,” said Josh Schamberger, the president of Think Iowa City, in a text message to The Gazette. “We will do everything possible to exceed the expectations of both athletes and spectators.”

This will be Xtream Arena’s second consecutive year hosting the collegiate women’s wrestling championships. The NCWWC — the championship-organizing coalition before women’s wrestling became an NCAA championship sport — moved the finals site from Cedar Rapids to Coralville after the 2024 championships.

The NCAA announced the elevation of women’s wrestling from an emerging sport to a championship sport earlier this year. Iowa remains the only power-conference intercollegiate athletic department to sponsor a women’s wrestling team.

With the NCAA now running the sport, each team can have up to 10 entries — one in each weight class. That is the same number as in the NCAA men’s wrestling championships, but it is down from the 15 entries that each team could have when NCWWC operated the tournament.

Comments: john.steppe@thegazette.com

Sign up for our curated Iowa Hawkeyes athletics newsletter at thegazette.com/hawks.