The 2025 NCAA brackets are here! Check out the below article to see a breakdown of the top 5 most surprising seeds at this year's NCAA Tournament.

2025 NCAA Tournament Brackets

141 lbs - Andrew Alirez, #8 Seed

2023 NCAA Champ Andrew Alirez got the #8 seed with a 16-1 record with his only loss coming to Tagen Jamison at the Big 12 Tournament. Alirez will have Bellarmine’s AJ Rallo in his opening match and then will likely wrestle Jacob Frost in round 2. The match against Frost is a rematch of the third place at Big 12s where Alirez won 8-2.

The real story here is that Alirez will likely wrestle Big 10 champ and top seed Brock Hardy in the quarterfinals! Hardy had a phenomenal Big Ten's defeating both Jesse Mendez and Vance Vombaur on his way to gold. Alirez and Hardy have never wrestled in their college careers and this match has the potential to be one of the best quarters of the tournament.

157 lbs - Jacori Teemer, #18 Seed

Returning NCAA runner-up Jacori Teemer is the #18 seed! This means that if Teemer wins his first match, he’ll likely wrestle #2 Meyer Shapiro in the second round. Shapiro and Teemer have never wrestled before but at the beginning of the year, no one would have predicted the 2024 2nd and 3rd place finishers would meet in the second round at NCAAs! 

Teemer is only 8-4 this year and finished 7th at Big Ten’s losing to Ethen Miller and Tommy Askey. Shapiro has been fantastic this year and will enter this match as the big favorite. However, there’s still a ton of heat surrounding this match and it should be outstanding.

165 lbs - Nicco Ruiz, #15 Seed

Because Nicco Ruiz forfeited out of Big 12s to place 6th, it’s not entirely surprising that his seed took a hit here. However, it’s worth noting that Ruiz has wins this year over Cam Amine, Jack Thomsen, and Brock Mantanona. #2 seed Peyton Hall did just defeat Ruiz in the semifinals at Big 12s (8-2) but there were certainly easier second-round matchups for Hall. Ruiz is dangerous and has the potential to blow up this bracket if he’s wrestling his best.

174 lbs - Lorenzo Norman, #16 Seed

After Lorenzo Norman’s runner-up finish at CKLV where he only lost to Dean Hamiti (4-3), many were saying Norman was a dark horse to make the finals at 174 pounds. On top of that finish, Norman has notable victories this year over Nelson Brands, Danny Wask, Garrett Thompson, Nick Incontrera, Alex Cramer, and Luca Augustine. However, Norman had a rough finish to the season losing 3 of his last 5 matches to Luca Augustine, Lennox Wolak, and Josh Ogunsanya. Even still, if Norman is back to wrestling how he was in the early season, we could see him give Keegan O’Toole a tough match in the second round and has the potential to make a run to the podium.

197 lbs - Stephen Little, #12 Seed

Stephen Little placed 7th at NCAAs last year and has an 18-3 record this season. He suffered losses to AJ Ferrari, Josh Barr, and Luke Surber. Those certainly aren’t bad losses but Little was hit in the seeding because he has a low RPI and his best win this year is over #13 seed Trey Munoz. Little has the potential to “blow up” this bracket if he defeats #5 seed Michael Beard in the second round. The two notably wrestled at NCAAs last year in the 7th place match with Little coming out on top, 10-3.

Rank vs Seed For Every Qualifier

Now take a look at how every wrestler's seed compares to their national ranking.