Oklahoma State University’s wrestling team secured its second consecutive Big 12 championship on Saturday, achieving its 57th overall conference title. The Cowboys finished the 2026 Big 12 Wrestling Championship with individual titles from Casey Swiderski (149 pounds), Troy Spratley (125 pounds), Jax Forrest (133 pounds), and Sergio Vega (141 pounds).
The team accumulated 176 points, marking the second-highest total in Big 12 tournament history. Only Oklahoma State’s own record of 176.5 points in 2017 stands higher. This year’s score placed them well ahead of Iowa State, which finished second with 144 points.
“It was good,” coach David Taylor said. “This is a really tough tournament. There’s ups and downs even in the finals. We talked to our guys about being present and staying in the moment and that’s still true even in these big matches. … We’ve got some adjustments that we’ve got to make, and we’ll get those addressed before the national championships.”
Taylor became only the second coach in Big 12 history to win team titles in each of his first two seasons as head coach, joining Cael Sanderson who accomplished this with Iowa State from 2007-09.
Jax Forrest was named Most Outstanding Wrestler after earning bonus point wins in all four bouts during the weekend. He is now the third true freshman at Oklahoma State to receive this honor, following Coleman Scott (2005) and AJ Ferrari (2021). Forrest’s victory alongside Vega’s marked just the third time OSU has had two true freshmen win conference championships in one year.
With a significant lead going into the finals, Oklahoma State needed only one win to secure the team title. That came quickly when Casey Swiderski defeated Caleb Rathjen of Northern Iowa at 149 pounds with a score of 5-3.
Spratley followed by winning his final match after trailing early, securing a reversal and nearfall for a final score of 5-2 against Stevo Poulin of Iowa State.
Forrest continued his dominant performance by defeating Kyler Larkin of Arizona State with a major decision, finishing at 15-2. Over the weekend, he scored a total of 70 points—12 more than any other wrestler at the tournament.
Sergio Vega closed out Oklahoma State’s night by edging Anthony Echemendia of Iowa State in a tiebreaker rideout for a narrow 2-1 victory.
Attendance also set records as more than seven thousand fans attended at Tulsa’s BOK Center for what became a new session attendance record for the Big 12 championship.
The team’s latest achievement marks their 55th conference tournament title in wrestling since joining their current league structure; they have now won twenty-one out of thirty possible Big 12 tournament trophies awarded so far.
With these results, Oklahoma State has accumulated a total of 126 individual Big 12 championships and reached an all-time tally of over three hundred conference individual titles throughout its wrestling history.
Other finalists from OSU included Landon Robideau (157 pounds), LaDarion Lockett (165 pounds), Alex Facundo (174 pounds), and Konner Doucet (heavyweight), who each dropped close decisions during their respective matches.
Oklahoma State will next compete at the NCAA Championships scheduled for March 19–21 at Rocket Arena in Cleveland.