Ready, Wrestle! Bees Hit the Mats

Wrestling in Iowa?

That just fits.

"You can't be in the wrestling community and not appreciate the wrestling culture in Iowa," Bo Bettinson said of a competitive sport whose roots reach into virtually every high school, large and small, across the state. "The wrestling history out here is unmatched anywhere in the country."

St. Ambrose University made some history on November 1 when wrestling debuted as one of two new varsity sports. Bettinson and his 23-strong crew of Fighting Bees matmen scored a 24-23 win over cross-river rival Augustana in a packed Lee Lohman Arena. The meet was one of three home matches this year.

The Bees are wrestling in the Heart of America Conference, which includes such familiar SAU rivals from the former Midwest Collegiate Conference as William Penn, Graceland, Grand View and Waldorf.

A native of the state of Nevada who wrestled and assisted at Waldorf in Forest City, Iowa, from 2011-2017, Bettinson looks to build a winner in a state where the legendary Dan Gable set the bar for collegiate wrestling success years ago at the University of Iowa.

Bettinson said fellow coaches marvel at the depth of his initial roster, which allowed the fledgling Bees to field a wrestler in every weight class, with ample back-up support.

"That was a big goal," said Bettinson, who began building the program following his November 2020 hire.

"I wanted to make sure we had somebody out there representing at every weight class."

The roster is sure to grow stronger in coming years with a state-of-the-art wrestling-only facility added at the St. Vincent's Athletics Complex.

"There's not a lot of places of our size in the country that have their own wrestling facility," said the coach. "We have three full wrestling mats, which is a massive room. That's a bit of a selling point."

Also new to the varsity sports roster this year is Winter Guard/Indoor Marching Arts.