Wrestling is the world's oldest sport. In Arkansas, it's the newest.
Follow the University of Arkansas at Little Rock as it starts up a brand new sport in a place that hasn't seen major college wrestling in half a century. Rocked up follows the fledgling wrestling program as it begins from scratch with a start date of November 2019.
Produced by the Mat Talk Podcast Network.
Oct 15, 2019
With coaches hired and administrative support set, the first
whistle blows for Little Rock’s first wrestling dual in November of
2019. But even before that dual and that official season commences,
there’s one athlete who’s already ready to roll.
When new programs are started, colleges typically decide to hire a
coach and recruit athletes the year prior to actual competition.
Those coaches will then redshirt those athletes, allowing them to
practice and preserve eligibility, but they aren’t typically
competing. They’re a team, but they’re not yet a team.
Such is the case with Conner Ward, a Kansas native who during the
first semester of the 2018-19 academic year, was the ONLY wrestler
at the school. A handful of wrestlers would transfer in for the
second semester, but during the first semester, Conner Ward was
“The Little Rock guy,” the only wrestler on a team that really
didn’t even exist yet.
Last season, Ward was the most unique wrestler in the country and
today, we’ll find out how and why that materialized.
Welcome to Rocked Up, the story of the foundation and formation of
the first Division I college wrestling program in Arkansas,
starting in November of 2019 at the University of Arkansas at
Little Rock. This is the eighth edition of this story. We started
the journey developing the foundation of wrestling in the state of
Arkansas and now we’ve moved on to the formation of the team,
because to tell the full story of this program, you have to start
at the very beginning.
Rocked Up is a presentation of the Mat Talk Podcast Network and can
be found on the web at GetRockedUp.com or at MatTalkOnline.com.
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