The NWCA All-Star Classic offers some early season fireworks for wrestling fans, exhibition-style. Six former NCAA and NCWWC champs took the mat as part of the event in New Jersey, with five of those former title winners securing victories to kick off their season while a number of other All-Americans and high-profile stars showcased their potential for greatness this season.
Here's what you need to know about the results and what they could mean for the early part of the season.
Ryder impresses in Oklahoma State exhibition debut
Of all of the NWCA All-Star winners, only one â Zack Ryder of Oklahoma State â has never been on the podium. Ryder, a freshman transfer from Penn State, made headlines this summer when he moved to Stillwater to train with David Taylor following Rocco Welsh's transfer to Penn State from Ohio State. The move has paid off for Ryder.
In his first college exhibition match with the Cowboys, Ryder majored Maryland senior All-American Jaxon Smith 14-4, leaving no doubt that Ryder is not only at the level he needs to be at but could potentially compete for a title as a rookie. Ryder was all offense from the starting whistle too, and his confidence and aggressiveness will serve him well in his deep weight class.
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â OSU Cowboy Wrestling (@CowboyWrestling)
Zack picks up a major over the No. 4 wrestler in the country in his first action for the Cowboys!
Ryder was one of just two athletes in the NWCA dual to win by major, and he did so against a veteran in Smith who is currently ranked No. 4 in the country behind U20 world champion Max McEnelly, No. 2 Rocco Welsh and No. 3 Angelo Ferrari. This is a top-heavy weight with challengers like All-American Silas Allred of Nebraska and funky freshman Aeoden Sinclair of Missouri also in the mix, but if Ryder can keep the pace that he showed against Smith up throughout the season, he could be another Cowboy who jumps levels after transferring to wrestle for Taylor.
NCAA champions remain a level above the competition
While the freshman Ryder stole the show with his upset over the senior All-American Smith at 184 pounds, NCAA champions Jesse Mendez and Lucas Byrd as well as NCWWC champs Katie Lange, Sage Mortimer and Reese Larramendy proved that they are still the class of their weights in their solid wins over All-American competition.
Lange, a 2025 and 2023 NCWWC champ, showed the greatest degree of separation between herself and her opponent, Zaynah McBryde of Life, amongst the returning champs. Her 11-3 win highlights her dominance at 138 pounds and sets her on a path toward another title in her senior season. Lange was one of two All-Star Classic champs for the Lakers, as teammate and fellow former champion Sage Mortimer also picked up a win against a Life opponent in Salyna Shotwell, 6-2. Mortimer is currently ranked No. 1 at 117 pounds after winning the 110-pound weight class last year.
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Iowa's Larramendy, on the other hand, had the closest bout of any former champ, edging out Esther Kolawole of William Penn 4-3 at 145 pounds. Larramendy won her NCWWC title in 2024 at 143 pounds and then finished third last year at the same weight behind Macey Kilty and North Central's Bella Mir, the latter of whom also earned a win at this year's All-Star Classic with a 2-2 decision against Latifah McBryde of Life at 160 pounds. The Hawkeye sits at No. 2 in the country behind Mir following the graduation of Kilty.
On the men's side, reigning 133 and 141-pound champions Lucas Byrd and Jesse Mendez each put up seven points against their All-American opponents, with Bryd stopping 2024 Big Ten champion Dylan Shawver 7-1 and Mendez topping 2024 All-American Anthony Echemendia 7-3. Both wins came by larger margins than in the past, as Bryd only beat Shawver 6-5 in their lone meeting before the All-Star Classic and Mendez edged out Echemendia 6-4 back at NCAAs in 2024. These more definitive wins against No. 8 Shawver and No. 6 Echemendia leave no doubt that Mendez and Bryd are primed for another title run. Shawver will have his chance for revenge against Mendez when Rutgers travels to Illinois on Jan. 25 for the dual while Echemendia will likely have to wait until nationals for another shot against Mendez.
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â Ohio State Wrestling (@wrestlingbucks)
The only national champ to drop an All-Star match came in the Division II vs. Division III showcase match where DII national finalist Khyvon Grace of West Liberty topped DIII national champion Mark Samuel of Roanoke 8-6. Samuel took the early lead with a first-period takedown, but an escape, a reversal, a penalty call and a buzzer-beater takedown helped elevate Grace to a win as he begins his chase for his first national title at 141 pounds.
Bastida earns statement heavyweight win while other All-Americans show championship potential against top-ten foes
Six other All-Americans picked up wins at the All-Star Classic with Iowa State's Yonger Bastida showcasing one of the more notable performances with his 8-2 win over Michigan transfer Taye Ghadiali. Bastida redshirted last year but will now chase a title in his final season with the Cyclones. Ghadiali is in a similar spot after redshirting last season and transferring from Campbell to Michigan with the goal of becoming a national champion. The All-Star Classic result shows there is still a gap between No. 1 Bastida and Ghadiali.
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Bastida has been a title threat before, earning the No. 2 seed in the 2024 NCAA tournament before finishing in the Round of 12, but this year is certainly his best (and final) opportunity to accomplish that goal. His biggest competition will come from AJ Ferrari of Nebraska at No. 2 and Isaac Trumble of NC State, neither of whom he's wrestled in college, but both athletes who can wrestle with the same kind of athleticism and length that made Bastida dangerous against Ghadiali and will make him a challenge for the rest of the weight.
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â Iowa State Wrestling (@CycloneWR)
At 149 pounds, Bastida's former teammate Casey Swiderski, now of Oklahoma State, notched a standout win against Ghadiali's current teammate Lachlan McNeil 4-2, creating excitement for Cowboy fans about the kind of talent Swiderski will display all season. Swiderski and Bastida wrestled together in the starting lineup for the Cyclones in 2023 and 2024, with Bastida earning his All-American honor in 2023 and Swiderski finishing on the podium in seventh in 2024. After a redshirt season last year, Swiderski elected to transfer to Oklahoma State to join a lineup with fellow transfers Ryder, NCAA champion Richard Figueroa and Alex Facundo. Cowboys head coach David Taylor has a good track record in just one season in Stillwater of elevating transfers to the top of the podium, as he demonstrated last year with Wyatt Hendrickson at heavyweight and Dean Hamiti at 174 pounds. Swiderski is currently ranked No. 5 at 149 pounds, though his exhibition win over No. 2 McNeil implies that he's a finalist threat. Don't count him out of the title conversation.
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Another athlete whose NWCA All-Star result proves that he could be a title threat is Virginia Tech's Eddie Ventresca who topped Lehigh's Sheldon Seymour 4-0 at 125 pounds. The 125-pound weight class is once again expected to be chaos, but two-time All-American Ventresca's early success against an athlete who beat U23 world champion Luke Lilledahl last season is a good sign that he's ready for the season ahead. The schedule doesn't lighten up for Ventresca either, as he could face Minnesota's No. 6 Jore Volk and either Ohio State's No. 19 Brendan McCrone or North Dakota State's No. 30 Ezekiel Witt over the next two weeks. He'll be tested at the National Duals more generally as well as the Cliff Keen Invitational in early December, but if his mach against Seymour is an indication of things to come, look for Ventresca to keep racking up ranked wins and establishing himself as a problem for the rest of the 125 pound weight class.
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â Virginia Tech Wrestling (@HokiesWrestling)
In his return to his home state, Roxbury native No. 4 Eddie Ventresca takes out No. 5 Sheldon Seymour (Lehigh), 4-0! đĻ
The other two All-American vs. All-American matches â Joey Novak of Wyoming vs. Stephen Little of Little Rock at 197 pounds and Ty Watters of West Virginia vs. Daniel Cardenas of Stanford at 157 pounds â both came down to overtime but were decided in dramatically different fashions.
Novak, a fifth place finisher in last year's NCAA tournament, had split matches against Little in his career, majoring the Trojan big man last year after getting majored the year before. This time, the bout came down to riding time in overtime. While excitement and offense aren't the words that would describe this match, Novak's grit and ability to win clutch matches against elite competition will be important as he navigates a dual schedule that has him running into NCAA finalist Josh Barr by mid-December.
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Watters' sudden victory win over All-American Daniel Cardenas looked different than Novak's, as he lit up the scoreboard in overtime with a takedown and back points for the 7-2 win. Watters finished fourth as a true freshman at 157 pounds before redshirting (along with Cardenas) last season. Now he'll look to make a run at the top of the podium in a weight class that is currently led by Nebraska's Antrell Taylor.
While Cardenas suffered a close loss in his All-Star bout, teammate Hunter Garvin earned a last-second win in his match against Lehigh's Max Brignola, 4-1. Brignola is currently ranked No. 10 after redshirting last season and going 0-2 at the 2024 NCAA tournament. The Mountain Hawk kept things close against the Cardinal too, holding Garvin to no offensive points until the last second takedown that sealed the match. Exhibition matches in November don't always indicate how an athlete will compete in March, but this match showed that the separation between No. 4 and No. 10 at the weight is inches, and, at NCAAs, that could be the difference between an All-American honor and a Blood Round heartbreak.
Cornell's Simon Ruiz rounded out the winners with his 9-6 victory over Nebraska's Lenny Pinto at 174 pounds. Much like Brignola, Pinto has not finished on the podium yet in his career, but he certainly wanted to make a statement at the All-Star dual that he had the potential to do so now. The former Husker turned Scarlet Knight shot out to an early 6-2 lead against Ruiz but couldn't hold on against Ruiz' elite top game. His next shot against an All-American will come next weekend against Navy's No. 6 Danny Wask.
