The growth and maturation of Wyoming’s Joey Novak was on full display at the 2025 NCAA Championships inside Wells Fargo Center. And it was never more evident than in the fifth-place match Saturday afternoon.
Novak pulled off his third upset of the tournament, defeating No. 12 Stephen Little (Little Rock) via major decision, 8-0. Those two met during the 2024 NCAA Championships and Little beat Novak by major decision, 13-5.
The 16-point turnaround was just one piece of evidence of Novak’s growth from a year ago. It was also one of four bonus-point wins for Novak at the 2025 Championships and three of those were in succession to earn All-American status.
“What a jump in levels for him. It was his maturity, competitiveness and belief in himself,” head coach Mark Branch said. “He had a bad Big 12 Tournament to his standards and to our standards. So, for him to believe in himself and come here and wrestle guys he was not favored to be in the match with, is a huge testament to what he’s doing right now.”
Wyoming finished 22nd as a team, its highest finish since 2018. The Pokes racked up 19.5 points and again many of those were accumulated by Novak.
“He fought all weekend for the team,” Branch said. “He came out today not satisfied, and that’s a hard thing to do when you accomplish the main goal (being an All-American) you’ve had all season. When you go to bed at night, it’s easy to turn that switch off and not stay focused on what you have in front of you. But he didn’t do that, and ending your season with a win is how you want to go.”
Novak owned a 6-2 record at this year’s NCAAs. He defeated Little, No. 5 Michael Beard (Lehigh), No. 9 Zac Bruanagel (Illinois) and No. 17 Nik Stemmet (Stanford) all by either major decision or fall. He beat No. 18 Dillon Bechtold (Bucknell) and No. 20 Camden McDanel (Nebraska) by decisions and dropped matches to No. 2 Stephen Buchanan (Iowa) and No. 3 AJ Ferrari (CSU-Bakersfield).
Other Cowboys that factored into the team score include No. 19 Eddie Neitenbach (184) and No. 30 Sam Mitchell (HWT). Neitenbach – who qualified for his first NCAA Championships as just a freshman – scored two wins while Mitchell picked up one. No. 30 Gabe Willochell (149) and No. 13 Jared Hill (157) each went 0-2.
Penn State won the team title with 177 points.
Below is a list of all the Wyoming results from the NCAA Championships.
Consolation Pigtail: Wynton Denkins (Campbell) sudden victory Willochell, 17-14
>157: No. 13 Jared Hill (0-2)
Consolation First Round: No. 29 James Harrington (Harvard) fall Hill, 5:46
184: No. 19 Eddie Neitenbach (2-2)
Consolation Third Round: No. 22 Donnell Washington (Indiana) technical fall Nietenbach, 19-4
197: No. 15 Joey Novak (6-2)
5th-Place Match: Novak major decision Stephen Little (Little Rock), 8-0
HWT: No. 30 Sam Mitchell (1-2)
