GUNNISON, Colo. -- Western Colorado President Brad Baca and Athletics Director Miles Van Hee announced on Tuesday morning the addition of women's wrestling as an NCAA Division II and Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference varsity sport, with the Mountaineer program set to begin competing in the 2026-27 academic year.

This addition increases the athletics department's number of varsity sports to 14 and will be the 8th women's sport at the University.

The physical structures for adding the program are already in place at Western, including the Tracy Borah Wrestling Room for practices, Paul Wright Gym for competitions, and locker room facilities for the team.

Van Hee will begin a national search for the head coach immediately. With an expected hiring date in June or July and an official start date of September 1, 2025, the head coach will spend the ensuing year on recruiting and setting up the structure of the program. An assistant coach will be added to the staff prior to its first season of competition.

Western's long and storied history of its men's wrestling program and Gunnison's strong community support for the sport made the addition of the women's program a sensible decision for the institution's administration to consider.

National Wrestling Coaches Association Hall of Famer Tracy Borah led the Mountaineers to the very first NCAA DII wrestling title in 1963, then repeated that feat by winning the title at the 1964 championship.

Over its history, the Mountaineer men's wrestling program has produced seven RMAC teams titles, 16 individual national champions, and 137 All-Americans.

Van Hee is the program's winningest coach with a career winning percentage of .657 (182-94-5), with current head coach and three-time All-American Charlie Pipher next on that list with a winning percentage of .633 (76-44). Van Hee tops the list for total wins, taking the top spot in his final season (2017), surpassing Borah's 176 victories over his illustrious career.

Given the strength and success of the men's program, adding the women's program grew more plausible as the sport's popularity grew.

Participation figures from Western's 2024 Rocky Mountain Wrestling Camps – started in 1963 and the oldest wrestling camp in the U.S. – included more than 350 high school and middle school girls, providing hard numbers that the initiation and sustainability of a program at Western combined with the in-place resources worked in favor of the decision to add the sport.

Statistics from the 2024-25 academic year show that 46 state tournaments for girls were hosted at the high school level. And after women's wrestling was added as an NCAA emerging sport in June 2020, it became an official NCAA championship sport in January 2025 with the first NCAA Women's Wrestling Championships slated for the winter of 2026, becoming the 91st NCAA championship sport.

The championship will include all programs from Divisions I, II and III, bringing together qualifiers from 108 NCAA programs that provide more than 1,200 student-athletes the opportunity to wrestle at the collegiate level.

The Western program will join an RMAC list that includes women's teams from Adams State University, Chadron State University, Colorado Mesa University, as well as women's wrestling associate members Simon Fraser University and Texas Woman's University.