New & Dropped D1 College Wrestling Programs Of The Past 50 Years
New & Dropped D1 College Wrestling Programs Of The Past 50 Years
Take a look at how the D1 college wrestling landscape has changed with added and lost programs since 1975.
There has been much discussion recently about the future of D1 athletics and what it will look like. While I can't say what the future will look like, I can show you what the past 50 years have been like. While there have been 45 new Div I wrestling teams added since 1975, either moving up from a lower division or as a new program, programs have been dropped or lowered to D2/D3 120 times. There were 155 programs 50 years ago and 79 in 2025.
A big thank you to Jason Bryant and his almanac that helped with the research for this project. You can find that HERE. A shoutout goes to the National Wrestling Hall Of Fame as well and their old NCAA guides which can be found HERE.
A look at all the added and lost D1 wrestling programs over the past 50 years pic.twitter.com/4t11opdjWy
— JD Rader (@rader_jd) October 29, 2024
Schools are listed below in their last year competing in the D1 national tournament or the first year they competed.