<p>twoinanddone, you say my stats are way off based on what? Your link on NCAA teams shows 219 DI/DII/DIII wrestling teams vs. 449 DI/DII/DIII lacrosse, so the source you’re referencing is showing that there’s more than 2x as many college lacrosse teams as college wrestling through DI/DII/DIII. Those were my stats. I’m purposely not including NAIA or junior/community college teams as quality levels vary greatly there, so they are much less relavant to the discussion of recrutied college athletes. My high school stats are being pulled from the primary entity that reports these things. I’m willing to grant lacrosse is played in states not reporting to the NFHS but 1) when the 14th best team in a state is 0-14, I’m guessing there’s not many relevant teams beyond that one and 2) the fact that there’s no acknowledgement by the NFHS of a sport in a state indicates to me its unlikely to be highly popular relative to other sports in that state. </p>
<p>Why there are so few college wrestling programs? The answer is Title IX, which has devasted the sport at the college level eliminating over 150 programs since its adoption. At the same time, wrestling remains a highly popular sport at the high school level. That’s the whole point of this thread – lots of HS wrestlers with relatively few college opportunities while lacrosse is on the other end of that spectrum. </p>