Hawkeyes capture national title in women's wrestling
It couldn’t really be this storybook, could it?
A first-year program, an unmatched spotlight upon it, and an expectation for immediate success – no, dominance – despite a field of competition more equipped than at any point in history to shove those expectations right back in its face.
That was this year’s Iowa women’s wrestling team.
And now, those very same Hawkeyes are your 2024 NCWWC national champions.
How about that?
I tried my best in my preview article leading up to NCWWC’s to explain to everyone what a monumental task was being undertaken by the 15 young women comprising Iowa’s postseason lineup. Then again after Day One – by all accounts a damn good showing for the Hawkeyes – I sought to get across just how formidable defending champion North Central (IL) was going to be for them to overcome.
Turns out I was one thousand percent correct about the absurd degree of difficulty…and somehow it still didn’t matter.
The Hawkeyes simply refused to be denied.
By night’s end, Iowa (204 points) had crowned six individual champions – tying the previous record set in 2021 by McKendree – while posting the second-highest team score in NCWWC history (also 2021 McKendree, with 209).
That team tally only grows more impressive when you consider that runner up North Central’s total (198) was the same exact score that won the Cardinals the 2023 title by a whopping 35-point margin. It’s also nearly 20 points clear of the highest scoring runner up before them.
A similar story goes for third place King (TN), whose 163-point total this weekend was 15.5 greater than any ‘bronze medalist’ in tournament history.
No women’s college tournament has ever been better than this one, and no women’s college team has ever been better than the Hawkeyes were across two days in Cedar Rapids.
“The greatest feats all could’ve gone awry at any one of a thousand steps along the way.”
As far as I know, that’s not a real quote by any person of renown.
(I say this because I’m the one who just came up with it about 10 seconds ago.)
Hardly a revelatory notion, some version of that sentiment is what first comes to mind when trying to encapsulate how Iowa wound up as 2024 national champions.
For instance, trailing 127.5-113 entering Saturday morning I knew it was going to take a hot start for Clarissa Chun’s team to stay in title contention. Never once, however, did I consider that they’d go all ‘scorched earth’ to the tune of a 9-1 semifinal record, including a perfect 5-0 against their chief competitor – all of them rematches from NWCA National Duals.
Sterling Dias (101), Ava Bayless (109) and Marlynne Deede (155) all backed up their wins from early January, while Brianna Gonzalez (116) and Jaycee Foeller (191) both reversed previous losses.
Gonzalez turned an 8-4 defeat into a 10-1 victory over #2 Sydney Petzinger, controlling the match from start-to-finish in wildly impressive fashion. Then to close out the round Foeller would counter an early throw attempt from #1 Traeh Haynes, taking the Cardinal to her back and settling in for the 0:42 fall.
Seemingly before you could blink the Hawkeyes had gone from down by 14.5 to up by 22.5, and chatter began to spring up as to whether that had effectively locked up the team title.
The answer? Absolutely not.
See, the ‘benefit’ of going 3-8 in the semifinals like North Central did is that all eight of those athletes get to keep on wrestling. And keep going they did, each one of them placing fourth or higher in the consolation bracket while racking up a bunch of bonus points along the way.
Just like that, Iowa was in chase-mode once again.
During that semifinal heater for the Hawkeyes, it almost felt like they could afford to ‘give away’ some of the good vibes (and results) as their coffers were so full. Next thing you know the complete opposite is being contemplated:
“Wait, is it possible all of that still won’t be enough?”
Ready for the big stage
After doing plenty of shoddy wrestling arithmetic during the downtime between the morning and evening (finals) sessions it was determined that Iowa was (mostly) in control of its own destiny entering the finals – seven of which were comprised of at least one Hawkeye.
Excluding the two matches in which both competitors call Iowa City home (101 and 116 pounds) and if Iowa went 5-0 it was most likely to win the title barring a completely lopsided/unforeseen bonus point disparity between the Hawkeyes and North Central.
(I realize I’m offering up a lot of qualifiers, but like I alluded to, this was some seriously complicated math for a lot of us.)
Things couldn’t have gotten off to any better of a start, as Jaycee Foeller jumped out to a quick 6-0 lead at 191 pounds over #3 Sandra Guerrero (New Jersey City). But the momentum shift soon after was enough to give you whiplash, with Guerrero dumping Foeller to the mat for four points, then taking what felt like an eternity (I’m sure even longer if you’re Foeller) to secure the fall.
Thankfully for Iowa, a bounce back performance was all but guaranteed as #1 Emilie Gonzalez faced her teammate #2 Sterling Dias at 101.
The seventh meeting between the two in just over 16 months, this one went in favor of Gonzalez (4-0), who, with the win made history as the first women’s national champion to don the Iowa singlet.
Up next, #2 Ava Bayless kept things rolling with a tight, tactical 2-1 victory at 109 pounds over #4 seed Kaelani Shufeldt (Lock Haven) – capping off one of the more underrated great seasons of anyone on the team.
Another all-Iowa final would follow at 116, as senior Felicity Taylor would reverse her fortunes from two weeks ago at regionals, knocking off redshirt freshman Brianna Gonzalez in a 9-2 decision.
A win and a loss by two of North Central’s three finalists left the deficit at 9.5 points with three bouts remaining in the tournament (143, 155 and 170).
Iowa’s remaining wrestlers?
- Reese Larramendy, 143
- Marlynne Deede, 155
- Kylie Welker, 170
First up, #2 Larramendy was faced with the daunting task of #5 seed Aine Drury (King) – who had previously knocked off the numbers four and one seed on her way to the final.
The Hawkeye struck first, hitting a four-point dump to open the action. From there, Drury, dangerous in a bunch of unconventional positions, rattled off five straight to take a one-point lead into the intermission.
If the sudden deficit phased her any, Larramendy wouldn’t show it. Early in the second period she’d get back to her own offense, not only scoring a takedown on the edge of the mat but catching Drury’s arm in a compromising position that she could take advantage of to get the fall.
Things got very loud after that in Allegiant Energy PowerHouse Arena – just in case you were curious.
North Central’s lead now reduced to just 3.5, senior Marlynne Deede took the mat with the chance to put her team back in front.
That’s exactly what she did, blowing open her match against returning national finalist (170 pounds) Cheyenne Bowman of King University with a second-period takedown and three additional turns.
9-3 would be your final score, and it set the stage for one last match that both fans and tournament organizers could’ve only dreamed of in terms of both the individual matchup and team race implications:
If you didn’t already know by now, Kylie Welker is a pretty darn special wrestler and competitor.
A 2021 Olympic Trials finalist at just 17-years-old, Welker recalled in an interview on Saturday night how she was nearly 20-pounds undersized for the 76-kilogram weight class at which she made that final.
So yeah, big challenges and even bigger stages aren’t exactly new to the Wisconsin native.
This latest occasion would prove to be no different, as Welker jumped out to an early lead, nearly pinning the three-time reigning national champion in the first period before entering the break up 6-0.
A half-minute into the second period and it would all be over after the redshirt freshman countered a Makoyed shot with a four-point, feet-to-back throw, cementing both the match and the team title in the process.
Looking back, perhaps the only real surprise was that any of us were surprised. After all, this is kind of just who Kylie Welker is and what she does.
She was the first recruit in program history, and on Saturday night she clinched the very first NCWWC team title in program history.
Like I said back in the intro, “It couldn’t really be this storybook, could it?”
I don’t know…you tell me…
A lasting achievement built upon the monumental efforts of so many.
One wrestler doesn’t win a national team title. An entire lineup does.
Iowa had point scorers at all 10 weights this weekend, while 12 different athletes attained All-American status (six champs, three runners up, two fifths, and a seventh).
One coach doesn’t win a national title either. An entire staff does.
Clarissa Chun is one of the best coaches not just in America, but in the entire world. And yet, her most impactful decision since accepting the job at the University of Iowa – other than recruiting total studs like Welker, of course – was probably the hiring of her two all-world assistants, Gary Mayabb, and Tonya Verbeek.
Furthermore, one school doesn’t help to set women’s athletics on a course for previously unfathomable acclaim and respect. An entire collection of incredible individuals makes efforts day after day over the course of time that finally pay off – be it for themselves or for others long after they’re gone.
Christine Grant, C. Vivian Stringer, Barbara Burke, Lisa Bluder, Tom Brands, Clarissa Chun, Caitlin Clark – the names go on and on.
They’ve all played important roles over time – some for decades upon decades, others over a ‘brief’ four-year playing career – to help make this latest indelible moment in Iowa women’s athletics history a reality.
The 2024 NCWWC national championship doesn’t happen without them.
And with scenes like this being the ultimate result of those tireless efforts, I’d say that’s worth celebrating the heck out of:
