My son is interested in wrestling in college-and although we can find plenty of good DII or DIII colleges that are good in wrestling, trying to find one that has a good football team at the same time is a challenge. He wants a DI football atmosphere-fun, big, exciting, but we will need a DII or DIII school for wrestling…and then once I have those choices I can look at the academics available. We’ve looked for schools just for the academics already but am curious what anyone things about wrestling options.
I forgot to say…he’s not playing football but hopes for a good football atmosphere to attend games
Would a good DII or DIII that is close to a place with DI football work? Ask him about that. If he’s happy travelling a bit to catch his football games, he might have more options.
West Liberty University is perfect.
Penn State has won 9 NCAA wrestling championships. And the last 4. Their football team is OK. :lol:
If a D1 football atmosphere is important, consider a D1 school with a wrestling club program (not referring to the intercollegiate program although the school may have both). There are no athletic scholarships for D3’s, so money is not a factor compared to club wrestling. It will be a lot easier to find D1’s with wrestling clubs than D3’s with a D1 football atmosphere.
If you substitute ice hockey for football, and switch D3 wrestling to DI, then Cornell University should be considered.
Mt. Union, UW - Whitewater, and Wartburg are all ranked in the Top 20 in both football and wrestling.
UW-Whitewater has the 3rd largest average home attendance in D3 at just over 5k. I like the above recommendation to find D1 football school with a club wrestling team.
2nd looking for a club wrestling team. It was great for my son, who was recruitable for D3 wrestling but decided he wanted less of a commitment.
Penn State actually has a club team in addition to their ridiculously good D1 NCAA program. A friend of S does wrestling club there. I’ll think you’ll find most of the big D1 schools will have club, if he’s open to that.
“Penn State has won 9 NCAA wrestling championships. And the last 4. Their football team is OK.”
PSU is div 1 in wrestling, OP wanted div 2 or 3, otherwise I would have also suggested Iowa.
It was said tongue-in-cheek.
If a school is a D1 school, it is D1 for everything. There is no such thing as a school with D1 football and D2 or D3 wrestling. D1 schools can’t ‘play down.’
If a school is a D3, it can petition to ‘play up’ in 2 sports, one male and one female and there are a bunch of sports that are really just one division (bowling, rifle) so the schools can do those too. Most do it for hockey (Colorado College, Union, St. Lawrence), Hopkins does it for lacrosse.
I think wrestling has championships in every division so it would be hard to ‘play up’.
Is that what you meant or is he looking for a D1 school near a D2/D3 school?
University of Nebraska - Kearney. I don’t think a true D1 football experience will happen anywhere not D1, but their football team has gone from awful a couple years ago to pretty good. The whole community is pretty supportive and follows the team pretty closely. Wrestling may be a tougher admit though, they get a lot of guys right on the cusp of D1. If you PM me details about his abilities and successes I can probably give you a good guess of whether this is worth pursuing.
Clarion, Davidson, Sacred Heart, Franklin & Marshall (DI for wrestling only for some reason), Long Island U, and much of the Southern Conference (except Campbell) have a lot of D2 and D3 talent on their rosters honestly. If any of them are fits academically and socially he could contact their coaches. I don’t know anything about their football programs, but they are D1 except for Franklin & Marshall.
I feel I should clarify that there is some talent on those rosters, but overall those teams tend to not field a full roster with kids who can realistically hope for a winning record in D1. I know a kid at one of those schools who was a low D2 recruit otherwise, but the school fit and I think he probably got a de minimus scholarship just so he could say he was offered a scholarship. The coach took him because he was essentially a free athlete.
If you have questions about specific wrestling programs you can PM me, S ended up D1 but I know quite a bit about the other divisions and some of the other coaches, D2 in particular. S is in college now, but I still follow the recruiting pretty closely, and most of the kids I know end up D2 or NAIA so I know those programs pretty well. D3 a bit less, although S had some feelers out there in case D1 didn’t work out.
You might want to try on the athletic recruit section. Not a lot of wrestlers there but lots of football parents who know football programs and probably know if their son’s school has a wrestling team.
@twoinanddone : Regarding your assertion in post #11 above that D1 schools are D1 for all sports may be incorrect. I believe that there are schools with D1 Ice Hockey & DIII for other sports.
Schools with D1 Ice Hockey which participate in DIII:
RPI, RIT, St. Lawrence University, Union, Clarkson University, Colorado College, and Merrimack College.
Several D1 Ice Hockey schools compete in DII for other sports. Some of these schools are: Ferris State, Lake Superior State, Michigan Tech, Mercyhurst University & there may be others such as Minnesota State at Mankato & St. Cloud State, Northern Michigan & Univ. of Minnesota at Duluth.