Wildcats Qualify Five for Nationals, Finish Fourth at Heart Championships
OSKALOOSA, Iowa - Baker women's wrestling had five wrestlers punch their tickets to nationals and came away with a fourth-place finish in the team standings at the 2025 Heart of America Athletic Conference Women's Wrestling Conference Championship on Saturday in Oskaloosa, Iowa.
Jannell Avila, Katherine Heath, Jade Martin, Kylie Robledo and Nevaeh Wardlow all secured spots in the 2025 NAIA Women's Wrestling National Championships, which is set to take place on March 14-15.
The Wildcats totaled a team score of 99 points to match its finish from last year's conference tournament. Grand View (192 points) claimed the title for the fifth straight year after earning four individual titles.
Avila was BU's highest finisher after the sophomore grappler took third at 180 pounds. She won three of her four matches on the day, including a 2-0 decision over teammate Wardlow in the placement bout.
Wardlow won her first match of the 180-pound bracket on an 11-6 decision and followed with another decision win in the consolation semifinals before finishing with fourth-place honors.
Heath came in fourth at 117 pounds after winning her quarterfinal matchup by tech fall and then staying alive with a pin in the blood round. She battled it out in the third-place match before eventually falling on a late pin.
Martin racked up four wins in the 138-pound gauntlet with back-to-back decisions securing her spot in the placement match and clinching her first trip to the national tournament.
Liz Cope also earned a fourth-place finish for BU with a big 10-0 tech fall in the consolation semifinals of the 160-pound bracket.
Wrestling at 124 pounds, Robledo won consecutive matches on the consolation side of the bracket with a tech fall and a pin before eventually coming away with a sixth-place showing.
It will mark the third straight trip to nationals for Heath and second straight for Avila with both wrestlers earning All-American finishes at last year's tournament with Heath taking third and Avila coming in seventh.
Robledo qualified for the NAIA Championships in 2022-23 where she came a point shy of reaching the semifinals of the championship bracket. Martin also competed at nationals that year as a member of Missouri Valley's national quad before transferring to BU this season.
Freshman Wardlow will make her NAIA postseason debut after piling up over 20 wins in her first collegiate season.
Following the conference tournaments, a 12-member committee consisting of conference raters and oversight members will meet to select the remaining at-large qualifiers until 210 wrestlers have been selected, which will be released Tuesday, March 4th by 5 p.m. (CST). The seeding and preliminary brackets will be announced on NAIA.org by 5 p.m. (CST) on Friday, March 7th.
The NAIA Women's Wrestling Championships will be in a new location this year with the tournament being hosted at Hartman Arena in Park City, Kan., one week after the men's championships.
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