WIAA WRESTLING CHANGES - TURNED UPSIDE DOWN

Changes are coming to the WIAA boys wrestling post-season next winter, and they aren’t just tweaks.

This is a major renovation. The WIAA’s Board of Control on Wednesday, June 25 approved recommendations from the Wisconsin Wrestling Association that completely overhaul the tournament. The key changes include balancing the number of teams and qualifiers in each of the three divisions, eliminating the regional tournaments and greatly expanding the team aspect of the post-season.

The number of individual state qualifiers overall will increase slightly from 560 to 588. Brackets in each weight class in all divisions will now feature 14 qualifiers, compared to the 12 qualifiers in Divisions 2 and 3 and 16 qualifiers in Division 1 that had been in place for many years. Those qualifiers will advance to state as the top two finishers in each weight class from seven sectional tournaments in each division.

The individual sectional tournaments will fill the first Saturday of post-season competition and lead into the expansion of the team competition. Under the current system, which had been in place since the 1991-92 season, only 16 regional team champions in each division had advanced to the team sectional meets, which have been held on the Tuesday between regional and sectional Saturdays. From the team sectionals, eight teams advanced to state in Division 1 and four teams qualified in Divisions 2 and 3.

Under the new plan, 42 teams in each division will battle in state-qualifying weekend for eight spots at the team state tournament in each division. This teamqualifying weekend replaces what had been the individual sectional weekend and eliminates the Tuesday team sectional meets.

That larger emphasis on team success is the main thing that excites Medford head coach Brandon Marcis about the changes.

“I think change is good,” Marcis said Friday as he and several team members were heading to a team camp at UWStevens Point. “I think it will be an exciting post-season for wrestling in general. From my perspective as a coach, I know wrestling is an individual sport, but the team concept and the team part of things makes kids better individually. You have to have both to have a successful program and to push kids to be as good as they can be. I’m excited for it.

“I know across the state all teams are happy about not having to do that Tuesday night sectional for the team part,” Marcis added. “That was hard on kids having to wrestle that Tuesday night. Just the playoff-style format for that Saturday should bring excitement to Wisconsin wrestling.”

The proposal was created through the work of a 14-member committee within the Wisconsin Wrestling Association that included head coaches, assistant coaches and even a club coach from schools of all sizes and regions of the state.

The tournament trail

The new tournament procedure starts with creating new dividing lines for the three divisions. The state’s 112 largest programs by enrollment will be placed in Division 1, the next 112 largest will be in Division 2 and the rest of the teams will go to Division 3. That is expected to be 121 teams this year. With many Division 3 teams not filling full lineups, the extra teams are not expected to cause many issues with too many wrestlers in a sectional bracket.

Up to now, the 128 largest programs were placed in Division 1 and the rest were split equally among Divisions 2 and 3.

Each division will hold seven geographically-based sectional tournaments on the first Saturday of postseason competition. Divisions 1 and 2 will have 16 teams at each sectional, Division 3 sectionals have an additional team or two. In these tournaments, each weight class will have brackets with wrestlers seeded from number-one all the way to the bottom. The first round is an elimination round. The winner advances to the quarterfinals, the loser is eliminated. But from the quarterfinals on, it becomes a double-elimination competition with wrestlers being able to wrestle back to second, third, fifth and seventh places.

Barring the rare possibility the winners of pigtail matches between the lowest seeds in Division 3 advance deep into a bracket, wrestlers surviving the wrestleback process will still remain under the mandated limit of six matches in one day.

While only the top two finishers in each weight class advance to state, the competition for lower places will be important as the top six scoring teams from each individual sectional will advance to a team sectional the following Saturday.

Those 42 sectional teams in each division will be electronically seeded from 1-42, which will determine the seeding at each of the seven, six-team sectional tournaments in each division. At the team sectional, the top two seeds will earn a bye. The one-seed will face the fourth/fifth seed winner and the two-seed will face the third/sixth seed winner in the semifinals. The seven sectional tournament champions in each division all advance to state.

“The way that we’ve always done things is that the team is first and team duals are fun,” Marcis said. “We always talk about wrestling for the team. The better the team, the better our individuals are. We’re excited about that.”

“I like the team aspect more than the individual meets,” said Medford’s Jordan Lavin, who will be a junior on the 2025-26 team. “That’s my favorite part about the wrestling season. Everyone on the team loves it.”

The eighth state team in each division will be filled by a “wild card” process. To determine the wild card team, each division will combine the first- and second-place teams from the sectional and re-run the electronic seeding. The highest seed that isn’t a sectional champion gets the last state berth. The state brackets will also be set following that seeding process.

“I don’t have any evidence of this, but that wild card team, I think some people might say, well there’s your number-eight team at state. I don’t think so,” said Chris Hansen, Hudson’s head coach, in a video presentation explaining the changes. “That wild card team, they’re going to be a high seed at the state tournament more often than not. That’s really going to prove that the wild card is so valuable.”

The individual brackets at state will continue to be seeded electronically as well, with seeds 1-14 for each weight class. The top two seeds will get first-round byes and wrestlers will continue to be guaranteed two matches at the Kohl Center, a change that began this past season at state.

As was the case at the 2025 state tournament, there is no wrestleback process to third place. Semifinal losers automatically wrestle for third.

2025-26 assignments

The WIAA released the 2025-26 tournament assignments on Monday. Though sectional sites were not part of that release, teams now know who they will be up against in the individual sectionals on Saturday, Feb. 14.

In Division 2, Medford’s 16-team sectional includes Abbotsford-Colby, Amery, Ashland, Baldwin-Woodville, Bloomer-Colfax, Chetek-Weyerhaeuser/ Prairie Farm, the Frederic Co-op, Hayward-Northwood, Northwestern, Osceola, Rice Lake, St. Croix Central, St. Croix Falls, Somerset and Spooner-Webster.

In Division 3, there are five 17-team sectionals and two 18-team sectionals. Cornell-Gilman-Lake Holcombe is in a 17team sectional that includes Barron, Bayfield, Boyceville, Bruce, Cameron, Chequamegon, Clear Lake, Cumberland, Flambeau, Glenwood City, Ladysmith, Phillips, Shell Lake, Turtle Lake-Clayton, Unity and Washburn.

Girls changes

Also last week, the WIAA Board of Control also approved two changes that impact girls wrestling only. The first allows programs with seven or fewer total wrestlers to request a waiver to have the opportunity to practice with up to three other teams for no more than two times per week during the regular season. The second, beginning this winter, assigns four regionals per sectional, rather than the two regionals which was used last year.

The girls 2025-26 tournament assignments also have been released. Unlike last year, Medford and Cornell-Gilman-Lake Holcombe will be in different regional and sectional tournaments.

Medford is in regional II of sectional B, which features Abbotsford-Colby, Athens, Edgar, Marathon, Mosinee, the Spence Coop, Stanley-Boyd, Stratford and Thorp/ Owen-Withee. The Wolfpack is in regional IV of sectional A which includes Bloomer-Colfax, Cadott, Chippewa Falls, Eau Claire Memorial, Eau Claire North, Elk Mound, McDonell Central, Menomonie and Regis-Altoona.

Girls regional meets are set for Friday, Feb. 13 with the sectionals being a week later on Feb. 20.