This fall, Ithaca College became the first institution in the Liberty League to take the next step in expanding women’s sports.

On July 29, the college’s athletics department announced the addition of women’s wrestling to the varsity sport agenda. The team will begin competition in the 2025–26 season and will mark the 14th women’s sport offered on campus.

After conducting a nationwide search, Ryan Ciotoli ’02 was hired Oct. 17 to lead the new program. Ciotoli competed for the college’s men’s wrestling program from 1998–2002 and following his graduation, Ciotoli was an assistant coach for the men’s team. He mentored 10 All-American wrestlers during his five-year tenure with the college before taking his coaching to local club teams in Ithaca.

“Watching women’s wrestling grow has been so exciting and I thought this would be a great opportunity to come back to college coaching and lead the Bombers to some success,” Ciotoli said.

The last time the college expanded its women’s sports offerings was with the addition of sculling in 2012. Before that, the golf team was introduced to campus in 2009.

Ciotoli said it was head men’s wrestling coach Marty Nichols who referred him to the position when the team’s conception was announced. Nichols, who coached Ciotoli through his time at the college, has led the men’s wrestling program since 1996.

“We have so many really good alums out there,” Nichols said. “I reached out to a bunch of them and he was at the top of my list. We had some other really good candidates as well, but I think we got the best available coach for the women’s program.”

In preparation for the team’s inaugural season, Ciotoli said that his experience coaching club wrestling in the community has aided in his recruitment plan, and that connecting with other club, college and high school wrestling coaches in the Northeast has been the primary method of getting the word out to prospective athletes for recruitment.

The number of women who wrestle in high school has grown from 800 to more than 50,000 since 1994, according to the Associated Press. In 2023, participation in high school women’s wrestling exceeded the numbers of rowing, fencing, skiing and rifle at the collegiate level.

Susan Bassett ’79, associate vice president and director of Intercollegiate Athletics, said rugby, fencing and triathlon were also in consideration for women’s varsity sports, but the athletics administration landed on wrestling because of its exploding popularity.

The college now joins 47 other institutions that host the women’s sport at the Division III level, which is expected to have its first NCAA championship in winter 2026. Sitting at the top of the Division III rankings is North Central College, which head coach Joe Norton has led since 2019.

“There are no scholarships at the Division III level so we had to dig in to build our program,” Norton said. “In the very beginning, we sold the successes that our men’s team was having. If we can coach the men to win, we can coach [women] to win, too.”

Similar to North Central, Nichols said the success of Ithaca College’s men’s program will provide a blueprint for Ciotoli as he navigates getting his team off the ground — even giving the college an advantage over other institutions that do not have men’s wrestling teams to build off of. The similar rules in men’s and women’s wrestling will allow both teams to feed off each other’s success.

“A lot of these [women’s] teams don’t have a men’s program that’s established, and it’s hard to start something where you don’t know what success looks like in wrestling,” Nichols said. “We already have somewhat of a plan. Obviously, women’s wrestling is different from men’s wrestling in a lot of aspects, but it’s very similar in a lot of ways as well. I think they can take off really, really quickly.”

Ciotoli said Ithaca’s extensive alumni network on the men’s side will help to bring a strong starting reputation for the women. The college’s men’s wrestling team boasts three NCAA national championship team titles, 12 individual national champions and 83 All-American athletes. The team’s coaching staff — one head coach and four assistants — is made up entirely of program alumni.

“Since day one, Coach Nichols and the other coaches on staff — before I was even hired — were showing athletes around campus and doing tours for them,” Ciotoli said. “For that incoming coach, they already had a list of interested athletes. Their support has been great.”

Although an NCAA tournament will be introduced in 2026, the team will not compete in conference play for its inaugural season. The college is the only Liberty League institution with a men’s wrestling team and will be the first to add women’s wrestling to its repertoire.

Because the Liberty League does not have any other wrestling teams, the college’s men’s program joined the State University of New York Athletics Conference ahead of the 2023–24 season. Bassett said she hopes the women’s team will be able to find a conference of its own as more institutions develop programs.

“Those kinds of opportunities are absolutely going to come,” Bassett said. “I’m just glad that we’re in the mix and we’ve put a stake in the ground and made a commitment to women’s wrestling. I hope that encourages other schools to do the same.”

Until that is possible, Bassett said the women’s 2025–26 schedule will be built around regional competition, working with schools that offer women’s wrestling in states like New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Potential competitors may include schools like Elmira College in New York and Alvernia University in Pennsylvania.

Norton said that establishing success in the new program will cultivate a positive feedback loop that will attract not only talented recruits but also tougher competition. However, he said the growth will take patience.

“Everybody wants to win, but it takes three, four or five years to see the fruits of your labor,” Norton said. “You’re not going to get national champions right away, especially when there’s other scholarship schools out there. Once you’ve had a little bit of success and something to sell on the wrestling side, then you can go and recruit some better high school athletes, but you have to trust the process.”

Regardless of what the team’s initial season looks like in the scorebook, Ciotoli said the growth of women’s wrestling has the potential to change campus cultures and provide opportunities for women athletes that they might not have been afforded otherwise.

“These girls in college wrestling right now are the torch bearers,” Ciotoli said. “They’re gritty, they’re tough, but they are also great academically and socially. You need those types of people on campus and I’m excited to bring them in.”