The Rise of Women’s Wrestling at the High School and Collegiate Levels

Vanessa Skildum, Staff Writer

Women have been wrestling for years just on men’s teams; in recent years, it has been separated into its own sport. Women’s wrestling is the fastest-growing sport nationally, according to the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS). Growth has also been seen on the collegiate levels in recent years. 

In 1993, Brookline High School in Brookline Massachusetts created a women’s wrestling team that became an official high school team three years later. According to Trackwrestling, Hawaii was the first state to sanction high school girls wrestling in 1998. Texas followed suit in 1999, Washington joined in 2007, California in 2011 and Alaska and Tennessee both joined in 2014. Now, there are 44 states total that have sanctioned wrestling, with the momentum picking up in 2018. 

Data from Flowrestling shows this increase with the 2000-01 school year across the nation with 3,032 girls participating in high school wrestling. In 2022-2023 there were 49,127, a 55.2 percent increase from the 2021-2022 participation. 

Wisconsin is joining the movement. The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association (WIAA) state wrestling tournament took place February 22-24. This was the 82nd annual interscholastic tournament in history, the first leading back to 1940. Additionally, this was the third-ever Girls Individual Wrestling Tournament, the first being held in 2022 after it sanctioned Women’s wrestling in 2021. 

Women’s wrestling hasn’t just been growing at the high school level. It has also been growing at the collegiate level. In the 1993-1994 school year, The University of Minnesota-Morris created the first women’s wrestling team at the college level. 

There are now 100+ National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), and National Junior College Athletic Association (JUCO) institutions that have women’s wrestling in the international freestyle discipline as a varsity sport, according to the Wisconsin Wrestling Federation. 

The University of Iowa became the first Power 5 school to add a women’s wrestling program in September 2021. The Power 5 refers to the five athletic conferences that are prominent and influential in NCAA Division I college football. The University of Iowa is a part of the Big Ten Conference which is one of The Power 5.

Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri also created a women’s varsity wrestling team in 2021. Together with Iowa, they joined Presbyterian College in South Carolina and Sacred Heart University in Connecticut totaling the number of NCAA Division I women’s wrestling teams up to four. While there are only four Division I programs, now, there are several Division II and Division III programs for women’s wrestling.

Division I programs have the highest competition between colleges and bigger athletic budgets. This means they tend to hand out more scholarships than their Division II and Division III counterparts and are more visible. This means more women see it advertised and gives them options to continue wrestling. 

Due to the growth in recent years, Women’s wrestling is on its way to becoming the 91st NCAA championship sport. Women’s wrestling has been considered an NCAA emerging sport since 2020. Emerging sport status means that it is on its way to becoming an NCAA championship sport in Division I. It will be accomplished if 40 schools add teams in the next 10 years. In 2022, the NAIA announced women’s wrestling as the 28th championship sport.

Wisconsin has four post-secondary schools with varsity women’s wrestling: Lakeland University, Est. 2018; University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, Est. 2019; Carthage College, Est. 2020; and Concordia University Wisconsin Est. 2021. All four are Division III programs. 

Women’s wrestling has been growing in popularity for a long time. It joined the Olympic games in 2004, and many other milestones have been accomplished in addition to that. That being said, there is still a lot of growth to come for this rising women’s sport.