WWU Give Day 2022

Introduction:

We are the WWU Wrestling Club. Our goal is to allow students the opportunity to continue to wrestle at a collegiate level. By having the opportunity available for students to continue to compete at a higher level we hope to create better coaches, referees, and people that go out into our local community (which include a World Strongman Champion and No-Gi Jui Jitsu Bronze World Medalist). In the State of Washington there currently is no four year university or college that sponsors a varsity wrestling team. As such we help to promote and are part of the foundation for collegiate wrestling in Washington. We are a grassroots movement that relies on the donations of people like you who take the time to spread the word about WWU Wrestling and donate to our cause.

This past season was our most successful yet, with 8 wrestlers qualifying for and competing at Nationals, one all American and two more that came up just short of all American status. We hope to carry on this momentum into next season with your help to get our athletes more mat time, higher level competition, and ultimately a better shot at getting on the podium next season.

Negotiations with the university are underway to convert unused space in carver into a permanent mat room for WWU wrestling. While we cannot guarantee that we will get the result we want, we have to be prepared to build this mat room either way, and that is where community support and fundraising is going to make all the difference. By donating, you can help re-establish wrestling as a permanent fixture at western for the first time since the 1990's!

Success and Competition:

We compete in the National Collegiate Wrestling Association and have coached four Western Wrestlers to All-American status, two males and two females! Over the past 8 years, our club sent 26 individuals to Nationals with quite a few qualifying multiple times. We hope to continue this success and add to our growing number of high level college wrestlers.

Due to your donations we were able to travel to San Francisco in 2019 and 2020 to compete in an open tournament at SFSU where we have faced stiff competition with one of our wrestlers even picking up a third place medal in 2019! We hosted our first tournament with PLU, CWU, UW, and EWU in 2020 and the past 5 years we hosted a dual meet with the UW Wrestling Club and are 4-0-1 over our past 5 meetings. In addition, past donations allowed us to purchase a mat in 2017 allowing for us to practice on campus, host events, and have easier access for students.

Community Involvement:

We would also like to announce our partnership with the Whatcom Wrestling Academy. The group is a non-profit operating out of the Bellis Fair Mall in Bellingham that hosts practices for wrestlers aged 5-18. We hope to use their space for extra practice time as well as to allow for our wrestlers to be involved in the local community.

Furthermore, many of our wrestlers have volunteered at Shuksan Middle School, Bellingham, Squalicum, and Sehome High School. One of our wrestlers has even taken positions up as an assistant coach at Whatcom Middle and Sehome High School. Others have coached at Bellingham middle and Shuksan for a second year as well. As a club we also volunteer at local events such as the Western Fall Welcome, April Brews Day, Western Preview, and Ski to Sea.

Thank You!

Any support from the community is massively appreciated and will go a long way towards western wrestling's biggest year in history! Thank you for your support even if it is just spreading the word, anything you give helps us so much and we appreciate it!