Pritzker first-year Marisol Nugent is no stranger to creating space for women’s wrestling.
She was the first female varsity wrestler in the Atlantic Coast Conference, rostering on the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s men’s team. After sustaining a hamstring injury, Nugent was not sure if her wrestling career would continue into law school.
However, that changed when a coach reached out to Nugent on social media to ask if there were wrestling opportunities at Northwestern for incoming McCormick first-year Victoria Jewell.
Nugent said she wanted to make sure Jewell had the ability to wrestle on campus.
Over the summer, Nugent and Jewell connected with other female wrestlers on campus and a group of nine women formed. Nugent said they faced challenges early on, though, with a lack of resources and practice space due to pending club sport approval.
“I would like us to be a fully established club sport so that we could have multiple girls at each weight class and regularly compete in tournaments,” Jewell said. “We need to be in five matches before we can compete in club nationals.”
Nugent said the team was supposed to be approved in November but were met with delays. Without club sport approval, they cannot compete under NU’s name, use University facilities or fundraise. The team currently practices at Evanston Township High School.
The team is expected to gain approval at the end of January, according to Associate Director of Student Organizations & Activities Joe Lattal.
“There are not a lot of Division I teams with the academic caliber that Northwestern offers,” Nugent said. “Why not give them this opportunity to keep wrestling in college to some capacity — maybe not the varsity level but maybe at the club level — where they continue their athletic career while also fulfilling their aspirations of going on one day to be a doctor or a lawyer or an engineer?”
Nugent said she had originally anticipated acting as more of a coach than an athlete, but spending time with the team inspired her to come out of retirement.
Jewell and Nugent both competed at the 2025 Ken Kraft Midlands Championships, a non-conference tournament held at NU on Dec. 29 and 30.
The pair were coached by Justin Oliver, an assistant coach for the varsity men’s wrestling team. Oliver helped Nugent plan practices, and he said he hopes the program continues to expand to eventually become a varsity sport.
“Ideally we get it granted as a full Division I program here at some point, and try to compete for national titles,” Oliver said. “Because that’s what Northwestern does. We win national titles, especially in women’s sports.”
Women’s wrestling became an NCAA championship sport in January 2025. Schools like University of Iowa, North Central College and Grand Valley State University have already established DI programs.
Jewell said she hopes by her senior year, NU will have a women’s varsity wrestling program.
“The sport of wrestling is not easy,” Nugent said. “You’re leaving your four hours of classes to go engage in hand-to-hand combat with your peers. That’s not an easy task. That’s not for the average person, but I think that Northwestern attains a certain caliber of person, where, for female wrestlers, it would be the ideal opportunity for them to really pursue wrestling at the highest caliber.”
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