Skip to main content
iowa logo

Repeat After Me: Iowa wins back-to-back NCWWC team titles

by:Tanner Lafever•about 21 hours•

TannerLafever

Iowa NCWWC champs team photo
It took an entire TEAM effort for the Hawkeyes to win back-to-back NCWWC titles. (Photo Credit: Julia Hansen/Iowa City Press-Citizen)

Here’s a question for Iowa wrestling fans:

What does it take to be a national champion?

A year ago, it took a nearly perfect semifinal/finals performance for the Hawkeye women to squeak past North Central.

364 days later, the second-ever National Collegiate Women’s Wrestling Championships (NCWWC) title for the Iowa program will be defined by something different – an unshakable perseverance in the face of adversity.

The 2024 Hawkeyes went 9-1 in their Saturday semifinal round, ultimately crowning six individual champions among nine finalists. Their tournament-winning team point total?

204.

The 2025 Hawkeyes had 10 semifinalists as well. However, they’d go just 4-6 with a spot on Saturday night’s championship stage at stake.

And what was their eventual first-place team point total?

201.5.

Same destination, different journey.

Sure, the biggest Iowa stars still shined brightly this weekend. Individual titles from Macey Kilty (145), Kennedy Blades (160) and Kylie Welker (180) – World/Olympic medalists all – attest to that.

But the 2025 national championship was truly won on Saturday morning – in and around those heartbreaking semifinal outcomes for six different Hawkeyes.

“There were some tough losses,” said Clarissa Chun of her team’s journey at nationals. “But being able to fight back for what the next best thing is – they picked themselves up.”

‘Picking themselves up’ was the exact theme of the 2025 NCWWCs for the Iowa program – one built upon far more than just the sheer talent most often attributed to its success.

The 2025 Hawkeyes took their share of hits this weekend. But each and every time they gritted their teeth and kept on coming – all the way to (another) national title.

Contributions from all 15 push Iowa to second-consecutive title

A year ago, Iowa finished with ‘only’ 12 All-Americans out of its 15 tournament qualifiers.

And its two lowest point-scoring athletes (Round of 12 finishers both) totaled just 10.5 points between them.

This weekend not only did all 15 Hawkeyes finish somewhere on the podium, but the lowest singular contribution of any of its point scorers was 11.

Said Coach Chun matter-of-factly regarding the top-to-bottom effort from her team:

“We brought 15 (athletes), and 15 All-American’d.”

“It’s a testament to each and every one of them.”

2025 NCWWCs represented the last (and only) chance for Nanea Estrella to win a collegiate national title. Yet after a Friday evening quarterfinal loss had ended those dreams for good, what did she do?

Rip off four consecutive Saturday consolation victories to score big third-place points for her team.

#4 seed Cali Leng – just 16-11 a season ago – may have finished a ‘disappointing’ 7th at 124 pounds. But guess what? Following her quarterfinal loss she won a pair of consolation bouts (each by tech. fall) to help add 7.5 extra points to Iowa’s total.

Top-seeded (and previously unbeaten) 117-pounder Brianna Gonzalez lost a pair of heartbreaking matches in both her championship and consolation semifinals. But that didn’t stop the sophomore from ending on a high note – a 3:44 pin of #5 Caitlyn Jackson (Lindenwood) for fifth place, tacking three more team points on to her overall tally in the process.

Gonzalez left the mat and embraced her sister Emilie – also a fifth-place finisher (at 110) and also disappointed after winning an individual title last season.

The twins cried in one another’s arms, perhaps both for the opportunities lost but also as a reflection of the deep emotional resolve the two share to keep on fighting for the next best thing.

Session III summary

Iowa trailed North Central by 3.5 points entering Saturday morning’s action – a fact I noted in my Day 1 recap as (likely) being of far more consequence to the pre-disposed anxieties of Hawkeye fans than it was a harbinger of a stunning upset at the conclusion of the tournament.

By the end of the emotional rollercoaster that was Session III, Iowa had fought its way to a 13.5-point lead – even despite a 4-6 semifinal showing.

Four different Hawkeyes went on to get the oft-cited ‘next best thing’ in wrestling – a third-place finish after one’s title hopes are dashed. Two others could’ve/would’ve taken third were it not for a consolation loss to their own Iowa teammate.

All 11 wrestlers won at least one match after dropping to the backside of the bracket.

Eight of the 11 won twice or more.

And 10 of the 11 earned bonus points in at least one of their ‘consi’ victories – the lone exception being Ava Bayless, whose win came against teammate Emilie Gonzalez.

Talk about “a testament to each and every one of them” – as their prideful coach might say.

Murphy/Estrella/Larramendy/Simon – third.

Dias/Bayless/White – fourth.

E. Gonzalez/B. Gonzalez – fifth.

Patneaud – sixth.

Leng – seventh.

Every single one of them fought tooth and nail for both themselves and for the Hawkeyes.

And it’s the very reason another NCWWC first-place trophy is making the short trip up the road from Coralville’s Xtream Arena to its new home in the Goschke Family Wrestling Training Center.

Hammering the nail in the team race ‘coffin’

Entering the finals, Iowa had yet to officially clinch the team title over North Central.

That said, the odds were certainly in its favor.

Not only would North Central presumably need all four of its finalists to win, but the Hawkeyes would have to completely collapse as well.

It just so happens that’s not really a ‘thing’ the Hawkeyes do – particularly the trio who claimed individual titles on Saturday night.

Back-to-back senior World medalist Macey Kilty, 2024 Olympic silver medalist Kennedy Blade and 2024 World bronze medalist Kylie Welker would all be one heck of a ‘security blanket’ by themselves.

The fact that Iowa had all three of them waiting in the wings to clinch its 2025 title (if necessary) – there’s never been a safer bet in Iowa athletics history.

As it turned out, Kilty got to do the honors with a dominant 7-2 decision over former Hawkeye Bella Mir:

The senior was followed in quick succession by first-period shutout tech. falls from her superstar teammates. In the process, both Blades/Welker capped incredible seasons wearing the Black & Gold singlet.

Between them – 52 matches, 52 wins, 52 bonus point victories.

For her part this weekend, Blades was named 2025 NCWWC most outstanding wrestler.

Meanwhile, Welker – now the first two-time individual national champion in program history – completed her entire 2024-25 schedule without allowing a single point to be scored against her.

(Seriously.)

And though the evening would close with Jaycee Foeller (207) falling in the national finals (for the fourth-consecutive time no less), nothing could put a damper on the latest crowning achievement for the Iowa women’s wrestling program.

Just the beginning

Remember my long-ago question, “What does it take to be a national champion?”

Well, among many things – plenty of which were demonstrated this weekend – it takes an insatiable desire to improve.

And in a sport like wrestling, where ‘iron’ truly does ‘sharpen iron’ every single day, those improvements benefit and reverberate throughout a close-knit room.

The Iowa women clearly have that type of environment in place. And they’ve got a leader at the helm who’s ever conscious of what it’ll take to continue advancing her program (and the sport) forward.

“We know there’s still a lot of work ahead,” said Chun mere moments after partaking in the celebratory championship photo.

“Just off the top of my head (there are) a lot of things for myself as a coach to help our student-athletes perform at their best.”

Mind you, these aren’t sentiments unfamiliar to those with a working knowledge of Chun and the Iowa program.

It’s a reflection of who they are, who they’ve been and who they’ll continue to be.

Because neither a name nor a logo has ever won these Hawkeyes a damn thing. They’ve never just been some talented front-runner ‘playing a different sport’ than the rest of their competition.

They can be bruised, and they can be beaten – the former of which was seen throughout this weekend.

But to do the latter, it’s going to take something entirely different. Because as the wrestling world also saw this weekend, the Hawkeyes can take a hit – even your best one – and keep on coming.

And next time, you’d better believe that they’ll be back ready and improved to take a few swings of their own.

Why? Because that’s what champions do.

And you’ll find the champs in Iowa City (once again).

You may also like