Hailing from Kingston, Pennsylvania, a town with a population of roughly 13,000, several Wyoming Seminary College Preparatory School graduates have found success at Iowa.
University of Iowa second-year student and women’s wrestler Rianne Murphy said her experience at the Pennsylvania school was very positive.
“Being at Wyoming Seminary was [my] first time being around other girl wrestlers. Indiana is the state I’m from, and they didn’t get sanctioned until my senior year of high school,” Murphy said.
The Crown Point, Indiana, native also noted the differences between her home state and a school like Wyoming Seminary.
“There really wasn’t any option for female wrestlers in the state, especially when it came to freestyle, which is the style that we train in college,” Murphy said. “I found it a very positive experience to get to be around other girls.”
Murphy graduated from Wyoming Seminary in 2024, where she was a Prep National Champion her senior year.
After starting at Iowa last season, she joined current seniors Kennedy Blades, Ava Bayless, and Reese Larramendy, all graduates of Wyoming Seminary.
Bayless, who was ranked the No. 12 recruit nationally at 112 pounds at Wyoming Seminary, noted the feeling of being able to experience women’s wrestling in a building phase, especially at such a young age.
“We were 14 years old, moving away from home just because we were so passionate about the sport,” Bayless said. “We also got to do it in a really cool social and academic setting, being in a boarding school and learning how to grow up and be independent.”
A native of Greenville, Pennsylvania, Bayless also expressed gratitude for arriving at Iowa at what seemed like the perfect time.
“I just couldn’t have written a better story for women’s wrestling,” Bayless said. “I’m incredibly grateful that, somehow, I timed it perfectly.”
Larramendy, who wrestles at the 145-pound weight level, credited the prep school for its impact as a stepping stone to wrestling at Iowa.
“I grew so much there, and I kind of found my love for wrestling there,” Larramendy said. “I think it’s because of the environment that allowed me to actually find the love that I had for it. I think that’s a big thing.”
The senior also praised Wyoming Seminary for giving her a positive experience that further ignited her love for the sport.
“The environment and coaches can sometimes tarnish the way that you feel about the sport based on what they do,” Larramendy said. “Having the team that I had around me, we knew how to have fun and build connections and when to mess around, similar [to] how we do here.”
While Murphy was coached by Bret Fry during her time in Pennsylvania, Larramendy, alongside Blades and Bayless, was coached by Erin Vandiver.
“Wyoming Seminary was really special,” Vandiver said. “It was a unique time to start that program, get it up from the ground running. It [was] kind of a new idea in the U.S. for high school girls [at] a boarding school to do solely freestyle. It was a really special six years I spent there with amazing athletes, surrounded by a great wrestling tradition.”
Vandiver, now the women’s wrestling head coach at Gannon University, gave credit to the athletes she coached during her time at Wyoming Seminary.
“They wanted to learn from everybody,” Vandiver said. “They were eager to learn. They were all in. They trusted the coaches, they trusted their team, they trusted the training. That’s why they accelerated, because they got a lot out of it.”