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Iowa Wrestling Notebook

by: Tanner Lafever02/13/26TannerLafever

Given how busy the Iowa wrestling calendar has been over the past week now felt like a perfect time to bring back an old feature to help folks catch up on some of the stuff they may’ve missed – or that I simply didn’t have time to cover as thoroughly as I would’ve liked.

And so, welcome to the latest edition of the Iowa wrestling notebook.

Coming up, we’ll get into the other half of a huge last weekend on the mat for the Iowa women.

We’ll dive into a fantastic performance by Hawkeyes past, present and future overseas at a major international tournament. And there’s also (finally) ticket news for folks with the first-ever officially sanctioned NCAA Women’s Wrestling Championships less than one month away.

With that, let’s get right to it.

Thoughts from the Grand View Open

With a 19-day gap between its last competitive matches and the Grand View Open, I was curious to see how the Iowa women would respond this past Saturday.

Spoiler alert: They acquitted themselves quite nicely.

With 24 entries among one of the tougher open tournaments in the country, the Hawkeyes were largely dominant.

Three different finals were all-Iowa affairs, and the Hawkeyes swept the top three spots on the podium at both 103 and 131 pounds.

As for several lineup battles, Saturday appeared to solidify their trajectory – the first of those being a season-long, tug-of-war at 103.

Solorio wards off Dias (again)

One of the best ‘rivalries’ in all of college wrestling is between a pair of Hawkeye lightweights.

And in its fourth edition this season, then-top-ranked Val Solorio won yet another incredible match against Sterling Dias. Dias jumped out to a 5-1 lead in this one, but Solorio slowly chipped away, finally finding a breakthrough four-point move with 0:30 left to complete the comeback.

A quirk of this season’s schedule means that it’s Dias who has most of the wins against the best non-Hawkeyes – one of whom pinned Solorio at Sunday’s “For Her Duals.” She could absolutely go to the NCAA Championships and win a title, too.

That said, Solorio has now beaten her all four times this season – and looks every bit a title contender herself.

New NCAA postseason rules dictate that Iowa can no longer qualify multiple athletes for the national tournament as in years past. And that’s a damn shame – because I’d love to watch these two scrap for a fifth time this year, quite possibly for a national title.

Even amidst the high-stakes nature of their latest clash, one of the coolest parts to see was the two of them slap hands between seemingly every break in action – a mutual sign of respect that could easily go lost between two elite competitors vying for one spot in the lineup.

And if there’s a ‘bright side’ to only one of them representing Iowa at the NCAA Championships – presumably Solorio – it’s that they couldn’t have possibly been pushed and prepared for it any better than by the teammate whom they see every single day.

Katja keeps on winning

The other spot of greatest intrigue in Iowa’s postseason lineup comes on the opposite end of the weight class spectrum.

There, at 207 pounds, Katja Osteen has seemingly wrestled the job away from fellow senior (and four-time national runner up) Jaycee Foeller.

Osteen, whose season debut was delayed until mid-December by a neck injury, has been on a tear ever since returning.

The Grand View Open was just the latest example, as she won 5/5 bouts via bonus points.

Also in the bracket was Foeller – ranked #5 in the country entering last weekend.

Unfortunately for the Missouri native, two more losses continued what’s been a tough 2026 by her elite standards – with Foeller just 4-5 in her last nine contested matches.

One of those losses was a 7-0 defeat to her teammate a few weeks ago. And when combined with Osteen’s superb run of form (now 18-0), it appears Foeller won’t get a fifth and final chance to climb that last elusive step up the podium at the national tournament.

The fact that such a dichotomy of elation/heartbreak can exist on one team is almost hard to fathom. But then again, that’s why these Hawkeyes are a program like no other.

Other odds and ends

While I do not foresee a last-minute lineup change at either of these next three weights, they each produced notable outcomes in Des Moines.

At 124 pounds, #8 Cali Leng took third in her bracket – defeating freshman Isabella Gonzales, 6-2, along the way.

Leng had been the presumptive favorite long before, but with Gonzales’ undeniable talent (which was put on display a day later) one wondered if the freshman could give the coaches something to think about with this final ‘audition’ of sorts.

131pounds could be described somewhat similarly, though in this instance a freshman really did upset the incumbent.

Unfortunately, I can’t offer great detail as to how it happened – speaking of Bella Williams’ 3-2 finals victory over then #1 Karlee Brooks.

To make a long story short, there were some (perturbing) shenanigans going on with mat assignments/live streams at the end of a marathon Saturday.

Williams’ one-point win flipped the result of their prior two meetings (won 4-0 and 4-1 by Brooks). However, I wouldn’t expect it to change who gets the nod for Iowa at the weight this postseason.

And finally, I’ll mention 180 for the simple fact that it illustrates some of Iowa’s obscene depth.

Kylie Welker did Kylie Welker things en route to first place – never wrestling longer than 2:18 during her 4-0 run.

The last of those bonus-point wins came against Naomi Simon, who’s redshirting for the Hawkeyes this season.

If you’ll remember, three of Simon’s four losses a year ago were all against Welker. One of those came at the national tournament, where the Decorah native finished third in impressive fashion.

On Saturday, a similar story unfolded – as prior to its (familiar) ending Simon pinned the second-ranked wrestler in the country, Isabella Renfro (Fort Hays State), to reach the final.

Iowa men go 3/3 winning gold in Croatia

As I previewed ahead of last week, a powerful six-pack of Iowa representatives took the mat against some of the world’s best wrestlers at the Zagreb Open.

Half of them were alums of the men’s program – and each put on a show.

  • Spencer Lee (57kg) – gold
  • Austin DeSanto (61kg) – gold
  • Stephen Buchanan (97kg) – gold

In his first international competition of 2026, Spencer Lee got off to a strong start.

Lee allowed just two points in three matches (which you can watch in their entirety at this link).

His finals win over World/Olympic veteran (and Penn State alum) Roman Bravo-Young may’ve ended in somewhat anticlimactic fashion. But Lee was already well on his way to victory (leading 4-0) before RBY was forced to injury default from the match.

As for Austin DeSanto, he won his third-consecutive international tournament – this one in a round-robin format.

Thankfully, he didn’t let a horribly officiated 11-11 criteria loss in his first bout deter him, because two bonus-point victories thereafter earned him the gold at 61 kilograms.

His entire tournament run is viewable HERE, but no single performance was better than his dominance of 2024 Olympic bronze medalist Aman Aman (India) – whom he pinned in the first period after building an 8-0 lead.

And that may’ve been the win of the weekend, too, were it not for the third of Iowa’s men’s freestyle champions in Zagreb.

That guy, Stephen Buchanan, gets the nod for capping a dominant run with a MASSIVE upset.

In just his second-ever international tournament, all the novice freestyler did was defeat an all-time great via technical fall:

Four-time World/Olympic champion (and 10-time medalist) Hassan Yazdani of Iran was the opponent. And to the shock of just about everyone, Buchanan weathered an early storm – turning a 2-1 deficit at the break into a 13-3 tech. fall which also served to loudly announce his presence on the world stage.

It was an unbelievable performance – which can be seen in full on YouTube – that left guys like Spencer Lee losing their minds in its aftermath.

And that should tell you all you need to know about how big a deal this was.

Past/present/future Hawkeye women impress

Switching to women’s freestyle, three more Hawkeyes strutted their stuff in Zagreb:

  • Everest Leydecker (53kg) – gold
  • Macey Kilty (62kg) – bronze
  • Kennedy Blades (68kg) – DNP

The lone champ isn’t technically a Hawkeye just yet, but 2026 signee Everest Leydecker will arrive in Iowa City soon enough.

And the nation’s top pound-for-pound recruit will do so having established herself among the best in the world, regardless of age.

Leydecker outscored her three opponents by a margin of 20-2. Two of those victories came against former World bronze medalists – including two-timer Antim Antim of India:

In that semifinal, Leydecker may’ve won on criteria (2-2), but the 18-year-old controlled much of the action.

She scored the lone takedown on a strong, methodical finish. And from there, mostly shut down the Indian’s offense.

Leydecker’s 7-0 victory for gold against 15-time World/Olympic veteran Roksana Zasina (Poland) was even more comprehensive.

Meanwhile, the only blemish in an otherwise sterling performance by Macey Kilty came at the hands of a two-time World champion.

Besides that 5-2 semifinal loss to Japan’s Nonoka Ozaki – a match in which the Hawkeye came on strong in the second period – all Kilty did was throttle a trio of high-level foes:

A first-period pin was the fate for each of Anastasiia Sidelnikova (fifth at 2025 Worlds), Grace Bullen (three-time World/Olympic medalist) and Eniko Elekes (two-time age-level World champ).

Not that we didn’t already know Kilty – a two-time World medalist herself – was really freaking good. But this may’ve been the best I’ve ever seen her wrestle, considering the competition.

As for Kennedy Blades, her lone contested loss came against reigning World silver medalist Nesrin Bas of Türkiye, 2-1.

She did injury default her bronze medal match. However, there’s been no indication it was due to an overly serious ailment.

Tickets on sale for inaugural NCAA Women’s Wrestling Championships

Several people have asked me the same question over the past week or so, and I finally have an answer:

Yes, tickets for next month’s first-ever sanctioned NCAA Women’s Wrestling Championships are officially on sale!

Hosted in the heart of WrestleTown, USA – Xtream Arena in Coralville will be the site of this year’s historic championship event.

(It also hosted last year’s final edition of the National Collegiate Women’s Wrestling Championships – a.k.a. NCWWCs.)

So, for any interested fans looking to attend, head on over to the event website and get ‘em while you can.

I look forward to seeing everyone there on March 6-7!

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