Three hundred and thirty wrestlers have one goal left in mind: a national title.
The NCAA Wrestling Championships will take place at the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City from March 21-23, and nine Hawkeyes are slated to perform. Aiden Riggins was the lone Hawkeye to miss out on the tournament. He did not place at 184 pounds at the Big Ten Championships or receive one of the 47 at-large bids.
Along with determining 10 individual champions, the national tournament will reward the top eight finishers in each weight class with All-American honors. The top four squads earn podium and team trophy finishes. Every wrestler in the tournament will compete in at least two matches in Kansas City.
If a wrestler loses in the first round but wins his consolation match, his chance at All-American status stays alive. This pattern applies to all athletes who lose in the first round — they have a chance to wrestle back to All-American honors, but if they lose again, their season will be over. If an athlete continues to win in the consolation bracket, they can finish as high as third in their respective weight class. Wrestlers who win in the first round, second round, and quarterfinals automatically earn All-American status.
The Hawkeyes finished with six All-Americans last season and have 163 total in program history. This list features three five-time, 25 four-time, 38 three-time, and 41 two-time All-American honorees. The Hawkeyes have three past All-Americans who will compete in the tournament, including Real Woods, Jared Franek, and Michael Caliendo. Since 1972, Iowa has crowned at least one All-American in 52 straight tournaments.
After an underwhelming fourth-place team finish at the Big Ten Tournament, the Hawkeyes have a lot at stake to keep their long-lived wrestling traditions alive.
According to seeding, Iowa is projected to finish ninth in the team race and without a finalist for the first time since 1989. The last time the Hawkeyes finished at or below ninth place was in 1972 when they tied for 11th. The last time Iowa finished without a team trophy was in 2016.
Iowa State is projected to place sixth, so if everything goes according to seeding, it would be the first time since 2007 that the Hawkeyes finished behind the Cyclones at the NCAA Championships.
“What you take from each experience adds up, and it’s the things that you can control, the lessons that stay with you that are going to catapult you into being the national champion or being in the best possible position on that stand that you can be,” Iowa head coach Tom Brands said.” Sometimes in life, it’s hard for a lesson to stay with you. Sometimes we forget — this is not the time of year to forget those lessons. We want to be better. We want to be making progress. We want those lessons to stay with us.”
Woods arguably has the toughest road to a national title out of the nine Hawkeye qualifiers. The 141-pounder, who finished third at the Big Ten Championships, will face South Dakota State’s No. 30 Clay Carlson in the first round. Carlson is a two-time All-American and defeated Woods in the 2021 NCAA Championships, 11-4. Carlson’s first matches of the season came in the Soldier Salute in December 2023. Since he hasn’t competed as much, Carlson was seeded low.
Woods was Iowa’s only NCAA finalist last season, ultimately falling to North Colorado State’s Andrew Alirez, 6-4, in the 141-pound title bout.
“Because of my past experience, I feel like I approach it with less nerves. There’s never not going to be nerves because of the high caliber of the environment, just the high energy in it,” Woods said. “But at the end of the day, it’s about the seven minutes of the match. Leading up to it, your preparation and all that matters, but someone could be completely unprepared the entire time up until the very last minute before the match starts, and you know, boom. They make it happen because only the seven minutes matter.”
Drake Ayala is Iowa’s other best bet at an individual championship. The 125-pounder also finished third at the conference tournament but did so by avenging his regular season loss to top-seeded Matt Ramos of Purdue, 4-1. Ayala will meet Cal Baptist’s No. 30 Elijah Griffin in the first round. The pair matched up in the regular season, with Ayala prevailing, 18-8.
“I just gotta be myself,” Ayala said. “When I’m Drake Ayala, that’s when the best product is on the mat. That’s when I’m wrestling my best and good things happen.”