Iowa women's wrestling in contention

After spending just over 12 hours parked inside of Allegiant Energy PowerHouse Arena, I can confidently say a few things:

1. Whomever is overseeing the musical selection for this weekend’s festivities deserves a hefty raise for their impeccable efforts.
2. It’s a good thing we’re close enough to the hotel lobby so that I can piggyback off its Wi-Fi when the in-arena signal gets a little on the fritz.
3. The Iowa Hawkeye women are wrestling one hell of an NCWWC tournament in the program’s debut appearance at the event.

That last part is important, because as I’ll get to later in this Day One recap, they may very well wrestle phenomenally all the way through tomorrow night’s finals – and it still might not be enough to win them the team title they’re hoping for.

(We’ll get to that in a bit though.)

All told, 15 different Hawkeyes took the mat across two sessions of action on Friday. Ten of them will compete in tomorrow morning’s semifinal round, and another pair are still in the running for as high as a third-place finish.

All 12 have already secured All-American honors.

Like I said, it was a pretty darn successful day for the women donning Black & Gold singlets.

A successful day 𝙬𝙤𝙣.#Hawkeyes

— Iowa Women's Wrestling (@IowaW_Wrestling) March 9, 2024

Iowa finished Friday with a 38-8 match record, including 34 victories by bonus (20 tech. falls and 14 pins) – good for an obscene 89.5 percent bonus rate.

Bouts of the day

Our first pair of honorees for this distinguished award actually comprise two of the three Hawkeyes who will not end their season on the All-American podium.

Both Ava Rose (123 pounds) and Emily Frost (130) were unseeded entering the national tournament, projected to score somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.5 team points each.

Instead, the true freshmen exited their NCWWC debut having contributed a combined 10.5 toward Iowa’s championship cause, each finishing just one win shy of All-American status.

In her opening match, Rose led Augustana’s Hannah Suboni-Kaufman 8-0 late in the second period, a victory all but assured. Instead of coasting to the finish line, however, she fought tooth and nail for a last-second takedown to secure the tech. fall – and with it 1.5 additional team points that would’ve been otherwise lost forever.

Rose would finish her tournament with a 3-2 record, including two more wins after falling to the consolations.

Frost, on the other hand, may take the cake for the entire weekend when all is said and done.

After losing a 6-4 heartbreaker in round one against North Central’s Sara Sterner, Frost wouldn’t return to the mat for more than six hours – and when she did, she just so happened to be sporting a massive tape/brace combination over her left shoulder.

I don’t know what the particulars/severity of her injury is, but you don’t just throw on something like that between matches for the fun of it.

Despite the additional physical challenge, Frost picked up a pair of pins on the backside of the bracket before her run finally came to an end in the Round of 12. The latter of the two kind of blew my mind.

Going up against #5 seed Marquesis Haintz, who’d beaten her decisively by 11-0 tech. fall back in December, Frost found herself in an early four-point hole with her season on the line.

Her response? A quartet of successful headlocks – her go-to move – the last of which Frost was able to secure for the fall and a major upset win.

With one shoulder obviously compromised, I’m not certain how the true freshman was able to grit through that position once, much less four times in-a-row. But she did it. And though I’m sure disappointment exists that she didn’t advance further, Frost can hold her head high knowing that she quite literally left it all out there in service of both her own and her team’s goals.

My final submission is a bout the outcome of which nearly turned disastrous before an incredible display of wrestling IQ/execution won the day for senior Felicity Taylor.

Taylor, seeking her fifth finals appearance and second national title at 116 pounds, found herself in a bit of hot water late in the second period against #5 Melanie Mendoza (King). Trailing 8-6 with 20 seconds remaining, Mendoza sought to expose Taylor from the top position for an additional two points and the lead on criteria. But rather than Taylor fighting the move and perhaps leaving herself in an even worse position with short time remaining, she more or less conceded the points in favor of bridging on top of Mendoza for a two-point exposure of her own.

Even better than that, the maneuver essentially planted Mendoza flat in the process, earning Taylor both the win and the fall.

Iowa head coach Clarissa Chun confirmed in a later media scrum that the move by Taylor was very much a calculated decision, lauding the senior’s mat awareness to pull it off in such a pivotal situation.

The pin also kept Taylor’s bonus point streak alive at the championships, making her one of eight different Hawkeyes who have yet to wrestle a full six-minute match this weekend.

North Central is as good as advertised, but the Hawkeyes have kept themselves in the hunt.

For all the gaudy Iowa statistics that I laid out from Day One in Cedar Rapids, the team leading in the standings as we move to Saturday is North Central.

The Cardinals (127.5) have a 14.5-point advantage over the Hawkeyes (113) with half of the tournament now in the rearview mirror.

Meanwhile, King University sits in third place with 104.5.

North Central has 11 semifinalists to Iowa’s ten, 14 wrestlers still alive in the bracket compared to Iowa’s 12 and has racked up bonus points at a nearly equivalent rate.

This is a great team – not a good one, a great one – and it has forced the Hawkeyes to be nearly flawless simply just to keep up.

These two programs only had three head-to-head meetings on Friday. That figure will more than double after Saturday morning’s semifinal round alone, when they’ll clash at five separate weight classes – each of them a rematch from the NWCA National Duals thriller between the teams back in January (won by Iowa 21-20).

(You can find the results from that dual HERE.)

The Hawkeyes probably need to win a majority of those bouts in order to keep within striking distance, or if not, hope that North Central falters in most of its six other semis while the Hawkeyes make hay across their own remaining quintet.

I’ll put it to you this way, we’ll have a much better gauge of how this team race is shaping up by about 1:00 p.m. tomorrow afternoon. Iowa does have a real chance at this thing though, which, if you read my preview piece ahead of the tournament, you’d understand what a major accomplishment that is in its own right against this all-time great North Central squad.

What to watch

It goes without saying that the Iowa/North Central head-to-heads can all be major momentum swingers on Saturday.

Those aside, watch out for these other matches as well, which could be pivotal in the aforementioned team race.

116 pounds – #1 Samara Chavez (King) vs. #4 Felicity Taylor (Iowa)

• Not only does the latest match in this back-and-forth series represent a chance for Taylor to make it back to the NCWWC finals, but if her teammate Brianna Gonzalez can upend #2 Sydney Petzinger on the other half of the bracket it could have a multiplier effect on this Iowa/North Central battle to end all battles.
• Chavez has gotten the better of Petzinger in the past, meaning a finish as low as fourth place could very much be on the table for the Cardinal. Combine that with what would be a guaranteed champ from an all-Iowa final and you’d have yourself a significant wrench thrown into North Central’s bid for a repeat.

136 pounds – #5 Holly Beaudoin (Colorado Mesa) vs #8 Lilly Luft (Iowa)

• With her final victory on Friday night, Lilly Luft guaranteed herself both an All-American finish and that she would’ve at the very least wrestled to seed (eighth place) in her first national tournament.
• But a win against Beaudoin would propel Luft into the consi-semis, guaranteeing her an additional three placement points (six for 6^th) as opposed to an eighth-place finish (3). Place third or fourth after that and it’s another 3-4 points added to Iowa’s team tally.
• In a race that could come down to the bitter end, every single piece in the Hawkeyes’ favor might help to make the ultimate difference.

143 pounds – #1 Alara Boyd (North Central) vs. #5 Aine Drury (King)

• Another weight at which North Central pain + Iowa gain could play huge in the team race; I actually favor the #5 seed Drury in this matchup.
• Boyd has not looked all that sharp at the national tournament, squeaking by fringe top-10 opponent Marisa Angelos (Northern Michigan) 4-2 in the quarters. Meanwhile, Drury is a uniquely dangerous opponent, as evidenced by a pair of first-period pins (one over Iowa’s #4 Ella Schmit) to soar into the semifinals.
• Combined with a win by #2 Reese Larramendy and what was once a projected net -4 for the Hawkeyes at the weight class would become at the very worst a +2.5 advantage (and perhaps grow much larger than that).

Look, could I have saved us all some time (my sleep-deprived self in particular) by just saying that Iowa wins = good, North Central losses = good, and both = best? Absolutely.

But sometimes I kind of like saying more or less the exact same thing while traveling down a far more adventurous route to reach the destination.

(We all have our vices, I suppose.)

Short time

Conversely, in a rare exercise of self-control I’m actually going to call it quits for the evening/early morning.

For tons more match-by-match commentary/analysis I’d encourage all of you to follow me on Twitter (if you’re into that sort of thing, of course). I’ll be firing away all day long tomorrow during what figures to be veritable embarrassment of wrestling ‘riches’ here in Cedar Rapids.

Day One was a wild, wild ride at the national tournament.

I can’t imagine what will possibly be in store for us next, but I’m sure as heck excited to find out.

RESULTS

101lbs – Sterling Dias
WIN Emaline Hicks (Simpson), Fall 1:42
WIN Odelia Lopez (Schreiner), Fall 2:48

101lbs – Emilie Gonzalez
WIN Morgan Beathea (UW Stevens Point), TF 10-0
WIN Gina Bolognese (Simon Fraser), TF 10-0
WIN Avery Kibelbek (King), TF 10-0

109lbs – Ava Bayless
WIN Emily Mendez (Adrian), TF 10-0
WIN Isabella Morales (Colorado Mesa), Fall 0:56

116lbs – Brianna Gonzalez
WIN Carleigh Czerneski (Adrian), TF 11-0
WIN Jaia Ashley (Schreiner), Fall 3:14
WIN Abby Nelson (UW Stevens Point), TF 10-0

116lbs – Felicity Taylor
WIN Rose Ann Marshall (UW Stevens Point), TF 10-0
WIN Tatiana Walker (Sacred Heart), TF 10-0
WIN Melanie Mendoza (King), Fall 5:47

123lbs – Ava Rose, DNP
WIN Hannah Suboni-Kaufman (Augustana), TF 10-0
LOSS Virginia Foard (King), TF 10-0
WIN Sandie Pfiel (Augustana), TF 15-4
WIN Jayden Bazemore (Gannon), Dec. 7-4
LOSS Mia Macaluso (East Stroudsburg), Fall 0:52

130lbs – Emily Frost, DNP
LOSS Sara Sterner (North Central), Dec. 6-4
WIN Anna Dicugno (King), Fall 1:26
WIN Marquesis Haintz (Simon Fraser), 2:52
LOSS Kylie Rule (Wartburg), TF 10-0

136lbs – Lilly Luft
WIN Gianna Anaya (Emmanuel), Dec. 5-0
LOSS Yele Aycock (North Central), Dec. 8-0
WIN Angelica Steffy (Mount Olive), Fall 2:10

143lbs – Reese Larramendy
WIN Taylor Cutler (Adrian), TF 10-0
WIN Cloe Charlesworth (Ursinus), TF 12-2
WIN Aine Drury (Elmira), TF 10-0

143lbs – Ella Schmit
WIN Sofia Vergara (Emmanuel), TF 10-0
WIN Alessandra Elliot (D’Youville), Fall 1:58
LOSS Aine Drury (King), Fall 2:07
WIN Khadijah Sanusi (Sacred Heart), TF 12-1

155lbs – Bella Mir
WIN Tiera Jimerson (North Central), TF 11-0
WIN Molly Keller (Emory & Henry), TF 10-0
WIN Nina Makem (Augsburg), Dec. 6-2

155lbs – Marlynne Deede
WIN Emma Matera (Ursinus), Fall 0:47
WIN Nia Miranda (Mount Olive), Fall 4:55
WIN Alex Hofrichter (Dubuque), TF 11-1

170lbs – Kylie Welker
WIN Caylee Collins (Colorado Mesa), Fall 0:28
WIN Sidney Ramos (Tiffin), TF 10-0
WIN Schyler Caringi (Gannon), Fall 1:32

170lbs – Haley Ward, DNP
LOSS Henlee Haynes (Presbyterian), Fall 2:51
LOSS Katie Gakin (Emory & Henry), Fall 1:32

191lbs – Jaycee Foeller
WIN Brittney Reed (Emory & Henry), TF 14-4
WIN Ella Beam (Presbyterian), Fall 2:32
WIN Sara Lake (Lindenwood), Dec. 5-1