Super 32 is the best yardstick we have. Once a year the country's best high school wrestlers come to one tournament in Greensboro, and we get to see where North Carolina stands. Not only against every state in the country, but against ourselves: the North Carolina of a year ago, and the year before that.
By that measure, the top of North Carolina's girls' lineup has arrived. Four years ago North Carolina brought 32 girls to this tournament and came home with one medal. This year 42 girls wrestled, and two of them, Lauren Samuel and Ella Taylor, finished 3rd: the best finishes by any North Carolinian, boy or girl, all weekend. The medal count dipped, from three last year to two, but both of this year's medals are bronze, and they were won the hard way. Samuel and Taylor beat six wrestlers between them who also stood on the podium.
The weekend had its leaders. Samuel (Cleveland, 132), a freshman, went 7-1 and became a two-time Super 32 All-American; after losing her quarterfinal she beat the girls who finished 7th, 5th and 4th. Taylor (Cary, 200), unseeded, beat the #3 seed and lost only to the champion.
Not every number moved. Samuel and Taylor were North Carolina's only girls with winning records; North Carolina's girls went 26-82, and twenty-seven of those losses came against eventual medalists. Twenty-eight of the 42, 67%, went 0-2, down slightly from 70% a year ago. Growing the depth behind the top two is the work in front of the state. The four-year comparison below shows where we've grown and where we haven't yet.
The boys' tournament, headlined by Braylen Yates's All-American finish, is covered in its own recap.
How the grades work
Performance grades for this tournament, not rankings of the wrestlers. Each grade has one rule; a wrestler gets the highest one she meets. The same rules as the boys' recap.
A+Top-four finish on the podium · 2
ABeat two or more top-15 seeds, reached the blood round or better · none this year
A-Beat a seeded wrestler · 1
B+Beat a nationally ranked wrestler, or won five with every loss to a seed · none this year
BWinning record with a win over a state champion or placer · none this year
B-2-2 with a win over a state champion or runner-up · none this year
The full method
These are performance grades for one weekend, not rankings of who is the better wrestler. A grade measures what a wrestler did in Greensboro: who she beat, how far she went and who beat her. A win over a national seed carries the most weight, because most NC girls were unseeded and every seed they beat was a result the bracket didn't expect. The rules are the same ones the boys' recap uses, word for word.
Each grade has one rule, printed beside it above, and a wrestler gets the highest grade whose rule she meets. An A+ takes a top-four finish on the podium; two North Carolina girls reached it this year.
Only contested bouts count toward a grade's wins over seeds; a forfeit or injury default counts in the record, never in the grade. Every grade above follows its rule; none was set by hand. Within each grade, wrestlers are not listed in rank order. Wrestlers below that line are named in Honorable Mention or in The Rest of North Carolina.
The Bigger Picture: Raising the Bar
Super 32 is one of the toughest tests in high school wrestling, and a chance to measure North Carolina against the best competition in the country. This year's girls' results give us reasons to be encouraged.
Lauren Samuel and Ella Taylor showed that North Carolina girls can beat the best wrestlers in the country: between them, six wins over girls who stood on the podium, and two bronze medals.
The results also show how much work remains. We produced two girls' All-Americans and two winning records out of 42 wrestlers. The top is here; the depth behind it is what has to grow.
That's the standard we're chasing.
At NC United, our mission isn't only to celebrate individual results. It's to raise wrestling across North Carolina and measure our progress against the best in the country. Super 32 gave us another benchmark. Now the challenge is to build on it.
North Carolina Wrestling. All of It.
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Super 32 HQ: every NC result
Every North Carolina wrestler's matches from Greensboro, boys and girls: every Huge and Big win, every opponent's seed, ranking and titles, and the All-Americans, in one dashboard.
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