page_title: Collegiate wrestling
section_title: Tournaments
hierarchical_section_title: Collegiate wrestling / Season structure / Tournaments
caption_attribution_description: Two college students wrestling (collegiate, scholastic, or folkstyle) in the United States.
context_page_description: Collegiate wrestling is the form of wrestling practiced by men at the college and university level in the United States. This style, with some slight modifications, is also practiced at high school and middle school levels, and also among younger participants, where it is known as scholastic wrestling. These names help distinguish collegiate wrestling from other styles of wrestling that are practiced around the world such as those in the Olympic Games: freestyle wrestling and Greco-Roman wrestling.
  Women's wrestling at the US college level does not use the collegiate ruleset; it instead uses the freestyle ruleset as defined by the sport's international governing body, United World Wrestling.
  Collegiate and freestyle wrestling, unlike Greco-Roman, also both allow the use of the wrestler's or his opponent's legs in offense and defense.
context_section_description: Often, many colleges and universities in the United States will compete with their teams in what is known as a tournament. In the tournament, from eight, 16, 32, 64, 75, or more individual wrestlers/teams can compete in each bracket. This allows many schools to establish their rankings, not only for individual student-wrestlers, but also for college and university wrestling teams as a whole (e.g. a conference or regional championship, or the NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships). A tournament committee usually administers the event and after individual and team entries have been verified, the officials then determine the order of the matches (called "drawing") by certain brackets (e.g. brackets of eight, 16, etc.). The tournament officials when doing this drawing take into account each wrestler's win-loss record, previous tournament placements, and other factors that indicate the wrestler's ability. With that in mind, wrestlers who are noticed as having the most superior records are bracketed so that two top-ranked superior wrestlers in each weight class do not compete against each other in an early round. This is called seeding. Tournaments are often sponsored by a college or university and are usually held on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or over any of two days within the weekend. Admission is often charged to cover costs and make a small profit for the host. A tournament begins with weigh-ins starting two hours or less before competition begins on the first day or one hour or less before competitions begins on any subsequent day. An allowance of one pound is granted for each subsequent day of the tournament.
  With the drawing and weigh-ins completed, wrestlers then compete in two brackets in each of the 10 weight classes. If there are not enough wrestlers to fill up the bracket in a weight class, a bye will be awarded to a wrestler who does not have to compete against another wrestler in his pairing. After taking account the number of byes, the first round in each weight class then begins. Most college wrestling tournaments are in double elimination format. The last two wrestlers in the upper (championship) bracket wrestle for first place in the finals, with the loser winning second place. In other words, a wrestler cannot place higher than third if he is knocked down to the lower (wrestle-back) bracket by losing in the championship semi-finals. This is largely the result of time constraints: one-day tournaments often last into the evening. If the winner of the wrestle-back bracket were allowed to challenge the winner of the championship bracket in the championship, the tournament could continue well past midnight before finishing.
  After the first match of the round of 16 in a championship bracket in each weight class, the wrestle-back rounds would then commence, beginning among all of the wrestlers who lost to the winners of the round of 16. The winner of the wrestle-back finals would then win third place, with the loser winning fourth place. In tournaments where six places are awarded, the losers of the wrestle-back semi-finals would wrestle for fifth place, with the loser winning sixth place. If eight places are awarded, the losers of the wrestle-back quarterfinals would wrestle for seventh place, with the loser winning eighth place, and so on. After the championships finals, the awards ceremony usually takes place with plaques, medals, trophies, or other awards given to the individual and team winners with the highest placements. Precise rules for tournaments may vary from one event to the next.
  Each intercollegiate athletic conference or geographic area features two or three "elite" tournaments every year. These events are by invitation only. Hence, the commonly used name for them, Invitationals. Tournament sponsors (which are usually colleges and universities, but sometimes other organizations) invite the best varsity wrestlers from their area to compete against each other. Many elite tournaments last two or even three days. For this reason, elite tournaments are often scheduled during the college's or university
caption: Rather than seeking to execute high-amplitude throws, the collegiate wrestler will try most of all to break down his opponent in order to turn him over and secure a near fall or a pin.
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