LEBANON, Tenn.--The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) has officially announced the qualifiers for the 2024 NAIA Wrestling National Championships hosted by Visit Wichita at Hartman Arena in Park City, Kan. The 67th edition of the annual event will see a format change where six sessions will be held across three days. The action begins on Thursday, February 29th and concludes on Saturday, March 2nd.

The Phoenix have qualified 11 wrestlers for the national tournament taking one short of a full roster to the event. Chris Busutil, Sammy Shires, Jared Dinh, Elijah Griffin, Jack Latimer, Victor Guzman, Eli Clemmons, Cole Smith, Anthony Pyron, Rocco Horvath, and Kawaun Deboe each will be competing in the National Championships. 

Cumberland has had a great season and aims to cap it off at the National Championships. The Phoenix won the Mid-South Conference Regular Season Championship and followed that with the Tournament Championship this past Friday. Individually, Cumberland added four more Mid-South Conference Champions as Shires won at 133 lbs, Latimer won at 149 lbs, Smith won at 174 lbs, and Horvath picked up the 184 lb title. 

The Phoenix are returning five athletes with national championship experience with Cumberland. Cole Smith returns as a three-time NAIA All-American and 2022 National Champion. Sammy Shires is back after finishing fifth last season earning All-American honors. Jared Dinh, Chris Busutil, and Eli Clemmons each are making their second appearance at the National Championship after qualifying last season. 

Jack Latimer has national championship experience claiming fourth place and earning NAIA All-American honors as a freshman at Arizona Christian. Latimer was also named the 2023-24 Mid-South Conference Wrestler of the Year. 

Victor Guzman and Kawaun Deboe each are making their first appearance at the NAIA National Championship, but both of them have national championship experience at the NJCAA level. Deboe was the second place finisher at last season's heavyweight NJCAA National Championship. 

Anthony Pyron, Elijah Griffin, and Rocco Horvath will each make their first appearance at a national championship. 

Each conference tournament was awarded automatic bids per weight class based on the final regular-season rating, which can be seen HERE. Each conference is awarded automatic berths based on the number of wrestlers ranked in each weight class. Every conference receives a minimum of one automatic bid per weight class, which will be awarded to the tournament champions, even if the conference did not have any wrestlers ranked in the final regular-season rating. If a conference does not have an individual ranked in the final top 25, an allocation will be deducted from the original 25 to ensure that each conference is represented at each weight class at the National Championships.

After the conference tournaments concluded, a 16-member committee consisting of conference raters and oversight members met to select the remaining national at-large qualifiers. In total, 36 student-athletes were selected by at-large classification. The seeding and preliminary brackets will be announced on NAIA.org by 5 p.m. (CST) on Friday, February 23.

Grand View (Iowa), Southeastern (Fla.), and Life (Ga.) will travel a full roster of 12 wrestlers to the national championships while the Phoenix, Cumberlands (Ky.), Menlo (Calif.), Ottawa (Kan.), and Providence (Mont.) will bring 11 wrestlers total.   

The Cascade Collegiate Conference led all conferences with 65 individual qualifiers. The Mid-South Conference qualified 41 for second; The Heart of America Athletic Conference qualified 38 which narrowly edged out the Appalachian Athletic Conference for third. 

For additional information on the 2024 NAIA Men's Wrestling National Championships, click HERE.