Iowa women’s wrestler Cali Leng stood atop the podium as the 124-pound champion at the NCWWC Region VII Championships in Indianola on Feb. 22, a position some believed she wouldn’t be in just a few months ago.
Leng put together a disappointing 15-12 record during her freshman campaign but vowed to turn things around.
“This time last year, I was upset,” Leng said. “I was watching my teammates compete, and I wanted to be there so bad and had been dreaming about being in this position since then. So, that really fueled me this summer, and I didn’t hold myself back from training. That’s fueled me the entire season this year and kept me wanting to compete every chance that I get.”
Needless to say, she improved.
The second-year Hawkeye was ranked outside the National Wrestling Coaches Association’s top-10 at 124 pounds before the season started. Achieving that mark didn’t seem very plausible for Leng during the first half of the season.
However, Leng exploded in the second half of the year, becoming the No. 4 124-pound wrestler in the country and earning the NWCA Region VII Co-Wrestler of the Month for January. She attributes her newfound success to her strong pre-match mentality.
“A big thing has been my mentality going into each match,” Leng said following the NCWWC Region VII Championships. “Just getting ready for each match in a positive way, telling myself the right things, affirming myself knowing that even though I’m nervous, I know it’s there to help me, and it’s all going to be channeled into getting where I want to be.”
Leng shot up the rankings and appeared in the top 10 of the NWCA’s second edition of rankings in December and remained in that spot going into regionals.
At regionals, Leng dominated her way to a first-place finish. She went 4-0 on the day, including a pin and tech fall in the first two rounds, followed by a 7-0 decision win in the semifinals and a tech fall victory to take the title.
“All season, she was probably considered the underdog,” head coach Clarissa Chun said after the regionals tournament. “This was her first competition being seeded, and how she took that and framed and competed today was no different than how she has competed all season.”
Leng has shown marked improvement in many areas of the game, but she credits her practice routine and new techniques as the primary factors that could help her surge into the postseason.
“I feel like my chain wrestling has gotten a lot better,” Leng said. “Wrestling through positions without stopping. That’s something that just happened with constantly wrestling in the [practice] room and trusting myself knowing that I can wrestle through any position.”