Estrada signs with Iowa State
The Iowa State women’s wrestling program landed a big one on National Signing Day.
Christina Estrada, a senior at Buchanan High School in Clovis, California, signed with Iowa State on Wednesday. Estrada is a two-time California state champion and a two-time Super 32 champion.
The Cyclones will begin competition in the 2027-28 season, so Estrada will be part of the first team in program history.
Estrada’s resume has been building since her freshman season. As a ninth grader, she reached the semifinals of the CIF State Championships before falling to eventual state champion Jillian Wells of Lakeside. Estrada battled back through the consolation bracket to place third.
She didn’t have to wait long for a rematch. As a sophomore in 2025, Estrada met Wells in the state finals at 100 pounds. This time, Estrada led 6-1 after the first period and controlled the rest of the way en route to a 14-2 win and her first state title.
Her junior season was even better.
Estrada spent most of the 2025-26 season at 105 pounds and opened it by capturing a Super 32 title in Greensboro, North Carolina. Along the way, she knocked off three nationally ranked wrestlers: Hailey Delgado of El Paso Eastwood (Texas), Eva Zimmerman of Hillcrest (Utah) and Natalie Radecki of Caravel Academy (Delaware). She beat Delgado in the finals.
In March, Estrada wrapped up her second straight state title, this time at 110 pounds. She rolled past Alexa Smith of Orange Lutheran by technical superiority, 18-3 in 2:08, in the finals.
Estrada’s title was one of two for Buchanan, along with Alexandria Marin at 100 pounds. Buchanan was the only team with more than one girls state champion, and the Bears ran away with the team title, scoring 147.5 points to finish 38.5 points ahead of runner-up Marina (109). It was the first girls state team title in school history.
“You would never think ‘oh the girls are going to win too’ because we’ve never gotten close to winning,” Estrada told ABC30 after the state tournament.
Estrada finished the 2025-26 season ranked No. 2 at 110 pounds in the High School On SI final national rankings. FloWrestling ranked her No. 3 at 110 pounds in its 2025-26 national girls rankings. She also earned All-America honors at the 2025 Junior Nationals in Fargo, placing third at 105 pounds.
Estrada proved she could hang with college wrestlers, too. At the 2026 Women’s Nationals in April in Spokane, Washington, she placed third in both the U20 and U23 divisions.
In the U20 bracket, Estrada rolled past three HerMat NCAA-ranked wrestlers by technical superiority: King’s Amelia Murphy (No. 12 at 103 pounds), Simpson’s Isabel Kaplan (No. 8 at 110) and Northeastern State’s Addie Morse (No. 12 at 110). After falling to Virginia’s Sarissa Tucker in the semifinals, she edged high school phenom Jaclyn Bouzakis of Wyoming Seminary 15-12 for third.
In the U23 bracket at 53 kilograms, her only loss came in the quarterfinals against two-time age-group champion Cristelle Rodriguez-Dobler. Estrada responded with four straight wins by technical superiority, including an 11-0 win over Iowa’s Ava Bayless, a former national champion, and a 10-0 win over Army’s Clare Booe in the third-place match.
She also opened the U.S. Open this spring with a 10-0 technical superiority in 56 seconds over Indiana Tech’s Zoey Haney, who is now ranked No. 1 at 103 pounds in the HerMat NAIA rankings.
Estrada didn’t waste any time making a statement as a senior. She returned to the Super 32 on Oct. 25 and moved up to the No. 1 seed at 112 pounds after Tucker didn’t compete. Estrada opened with three straight 10-0 technical superiorities. After a close semifinal, she claimed the belt with a 12-2 technical superiority in 2:37, making her a back-to-back Super 32 champion.
Iowa State announced in April that it was adding women’s wrestling as its 18th varsity sport, making it the second power-conference school to add the sport, following Iowa. The Cyclones will carry 30 roster spots on their inaugural team.
Iowa State hired Alli St. John as its first head coach. St. John, formerly Alli Ragan, is a two-time senior world silver medalist who won two women’s college national titles and reached four national finals at King.
Before she gets to Ames, Estrada has one more goal in front of her: a third straight California state title in March. Buchanan head coach Troy Tirapelle summed up the program’s approach after last season’s title run.
“You start the process over again,” said Tirapelle.